


The Moon sets at Dawn

by lemony_sneaker



Category: Soul Eater
Genre: Angst, Blair is a good friend and a really good kitty, Body Horror, Canon Compliant, Death the kid does all he can to keep his world intact, F/F, Fix-It of Sorts, Gay, Gore, I switched a few things from the anime to make it work, Kishin crona, Other, Soul is gone, and that's really hard, black blood is spilled, crona is a confused ex prisoner with a headache, crona's in a pickle, he works in Russia now, maka is filled with angst and longing, mangaverse, maybe? idrk if gore is here but better safe than not, mildly cursed, or at least mostly canon compliant, ruling a planet nicely is hard, the complications of having a body double, the complications of sharing a body
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2019-10-05 05:35:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 25,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17318966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemony_sneaker/pseuds/lemony_sneaker
Summary: Seven years have passed since the Battle of the Moon, in which the kishins Asura and Crona were sealed away forever. The world celebrates this, but a certain meister named Maka Albarn has issue with the forever part and does everything in her power to free her imprisoned friend. One night, on the anniversary of the Battle, a strange object falls from the night sky and changes Maka's life forever.Join us as Crona and Maka reunite, the world teeters on the brink of destruction once again, the quintessential American road trip is had, and gayness overwhelms the cast.I will be adding tags as the story progresses.





	1. The Festival

**Author's Note:**

> This is my fix-it fic, bc the manga ended so sadly. I love it and think its a stronger ending than the anime, but Crona deserves to be happy and safe with Maka, and since Okubo won't do it, I have to. This is my first fic of such a scale, so I'm sorry in advance of any plotholes and continuity errors- just point them out and I'll do my best to patch them up. Hopefully I'll catch and seal them so you won't have to worry. 
> 
> The story might get hella sad, but I promise it's a happy ending. I hope you enjoy!

After the defeat of the kishins on the moon, life was busy for everyone. The DWMA was getting used to a new headmaster, meisters and weapons were beginning to relax after so long on high alert, and communities across the globe were healing and coming to terms with loss. While the DWMA was present to mitigate and fight against the worst of the effects of madness, tens of thousands of lives across the world were lost while the kishin roamed free. From neighbors killing each other over grudges to prison guards murdering inmates, from drivers raging on the road to mothers abandoning their children to starve, there was much for all to heal from, both personally and globally

 

Everyone needed a distraction, something to let them forget - even if just for a night - the horrors that they had seen and done. Thus, the annual Blood Moon Festival was borne: a night to celebrate victory over the kishins - old and new - and the heroes who saved the world from sure destruction. Every year for the last seven years, parties and festivals and celebrations light up the sky the world over.

 

No place, however, was more festive than Death City, Nevada. As the seat of Death’s power and home to many veterans from the Battle on the Moon, Death City goes all out for their Blood Moon Festival, so much so that many main roads shut down all day in preparation, even though the event doesn’t formally start until moonrise. Lanterns illuminate this Thursnight, flowers hang from signposts and windows, symbolic black, white, and red ribbons and banners flow between street lights above (black for the new moon which seals the madness, white for the removal of the stain of sin, and red for blood lost), and vendors set up booths and tents along the sides of main roads, hoping to capitalize on the going-ons. The streets themselves are bustling with people eager to do the next closest fun thing. Children dash from booth to booth, spending their parents’ money on games and delicious, greasy food while said parents fight hopeless battles to keep the kids in sight and under control. Students and younger adults crowd around the many concert stages set up for the numerous musicians and entertainers, the people buzzing with deafening noise every time a new performer gets on stage. With the moon solidly above the horizon, the festival is in full swing. Everyone is having a good time.

 

Everyone except Maka Albarn.

 

For her, today is not a day to celebrate. Today is a day of mourning, of remembrance. Today is the anniversary of when she last saw Crona, the day they locked themselves in the moon to seal Asura. No one cared about _their_ sacrifice, that ultimately it was Crona who had saved the world from madness. No matter what Maka said, she could never convince anyone outside her group of close friends that Crona deserves to be remembered for more than their misdeeds, actions they were forced into taking. To the rest of the world, Crona was just a kishin that needed to be destroyed.

 

Initially, she hated them for it, for their refusal to see Crona as a human deserving of compassion and understanding. She shut herself off from the world as she desperately tried to fix it, using every bit of knowledge, influence, and money she had to find a way to bring Crona down from the moon. She recruited Professor Stein as a research partner and, courtesy of Soul, began to study black blood, trying to discover all of its secrets. Egged on by Stein’s unquenchable thirst for knowledge, she even temporarily infected herself with black blood, her soul purifying and expelling the toxins. She failed to learn anything she thought relevant to her goal. She even sought help from the Witch Order and local witches, but they didn’t know enough about black blood to help past suggesting that it could, might be possible. After nearly two years of exhaustive experiments and research, she and Stein hit an impassable barrier: only Crona’s blood responded to the will of its host. No matter what Maka and Stein did, the blood in the lab wouldn’t move, take shape, or harden, and the only known method of getting that result requires melting a demon weapon: an unpayable price.

 

She was forced to give up, out of money, ideas, and hope. Depression followed, and Maka remained removed from society at large for another year. Soul and the rest of her friends forced her to take care of herself when she couldn’t be bothered to, and eventually Kid entrusted her with a co-teaching position in a NOT class. He reasoned that if she had something to dedicate to, she would find meaning and drive once again. She devoted herself fully to her class, trying to outrun the pain. While she felt better than she did during that year-long slump, to this day, her emotions and senses still feel somewhat muted. The sky is greyer than before. Candy isn’t as sweet, peppers not as spicy. Soul couldn’t make her laugh as hard. Black Star couldn’t make her as angry. On her worst days, even books lose their appeal. The only thing she feels as strongly as before is sorrow: loss and longing.

 

Maka feels that sorrow right now. She feels absolutely miserable right now, staring at the nondescript steel door in the DWMA’s bowels. Crona’s room. She only visits twice a year, lest the grief overtake her: on the anniversaries of Crona’s admission to the DWMA and the Battle of the Moon.

 

Maka looks at the familiar door, waiting. She waits so that she can cruelly convince herself that Crona actually is on the other side of the door, getting ready for class or to hang out with friends or something, anything to put life on the other side of the door. She fantasizes that she had been strong enough to defeat Asura without needing Crona’s sacrifice. She fantasizes that Crona didn’t leave the DWMA for Medusa, that somehow Maka had found them before they got away. She wishes that Medusa had been honest and given her back Crona after the Arachne fight. She fantasizes dozens of scenarios in which Crona was somehow still here with her, separated by only a few inches of metal instead of fathoms of impenetrable mad blood. The world doesn’t care much for wishes though, no matter how fervently one wishes.

 

Maka slowly touches the door handle, face scrunching up in pain and longing. She takes a deep breath and pushes the door open. Her fantasies, doomed from inception, die. Four bare concrete walls, a small rickety bed, a desk, a dresser, and a sink are the only things here: all covered in dust. It’s the same sight that has greeted her every time she opened that door in the last five years. Thanks to Death (he gave up the name “Kid” when he took his father’s place, and Maka refuses to call him “Lord Death”), Maka is the only one allowed in this room, excluding even the cleaning staff.

 

Tears begin to leak from her eyes and she makes no moves to wipe them away, letting her vision blur. She came here to cry, after all. She steps fully into the room and closes the door, drowning the room in nearly complete darkness as she breaks down. She falls against the door and slides to the ground before pulling her knees in close and resting her forehead against them. She begins to shake with grief, letting out screams of anguish. There’s no one in the school to overhear her, so she holds nothing back. She tries to remember the good times with Crona - in class with them, playing basketball with friends, teaching them chess, walking in the park, studying in the library or one of their rooms - but the memories are corrupted with sadness, an inescapable melancholy that permeates any good times she can recall. Even their final moments together, which had once been her drive, felt devoid of joy; she failed to return to Crona like she promised. She lied to the person who trusted her completely. Another wet scream tears out of her throat and she throws her head back against the door, ignoring the throb of pain.

 

The silhouette of the moon- a perfect sphere- hangs in the window, looking down at Maka in apparent judgement of her failure. She stares back at it for a moment, wiping away her tears for a clear look at the monument to her failings, as if Crona themself is looking down on her, disappointed in her failure to come back for them. She tears her eyes away from it before the guilt and self-hatred can take further root; tonight is about Crona, not her. She shouldn’t think so badly of them in any circumstance; she refuses to blame them for anything, until the end.

 

Her gaze settles on Mr. Corner, where she suspects they spent most of their nights curled in on themself, not that she ever got the chance to ask. She imagines them, curled around a pillow in the corner, sleeping fitfully, face expressive even while dreaming. She sobs again as tears force themselves from her bloodshot eyes, blurring the nondescript patch of walls into a swirl of grey and black, shadows twisting in the low light. She wonders how much they remember their time at the DWMA, wonders if they remember their time with her as dearly as she does.

 

“I’m sorry.” Maka Albarn, creator of the last death scythe, member of Spartoi, defeater of Kishin, molder of the next generation, sobs an apology into the forever empty room. “I’m- I couldn’t- I couldn’t save you. I’m sorry,” she whispers through the painful sobs and agonized cries. She sniffles and wipes away some tears, composing herself a bit before continuing. “I miss you. I miss you so, so much. I promised I’d come back for you but I failed. I tried everything and I couldn’t FUCKING figure it out. You’re stuck up there with the kishin because of me.” She shakes with self-loathing. She didn’t want tonight to be like this, filled with blame and self-hatred, but she expected little else; tonight is the night she lets the ever present, lingering pain take her.

 

Through the tears, she looks up at the moon again, still looming in the same spot in the window. The sight hurts her. Every night she sees the moon and is reminded of her best friend, lost again to the darkness they were born into. On nights like these though, the pain is multiplied a hundred-fold. When she allows herself to feel the pain, to let the memories resurface, to think about it, she feels like her heart has just exploded and sent hundreds of painful shards stabbing into every part of her at once: mind, body, and soul.

 

She looks around the room again, still collapsed in front of the door. It had never felt so empty as it did in this moment. Crona left little to be remembered by, no knick-knacks or trinkets around the room, no pictures hung up, or personals on the sink. Even their pillow holds no hair. The only physical proof that Crona ever existed at all is the single photo from Death’s party. But she always felt their presence, somehow, in their room, as if they were there just before her and their scent and spirit had lingered. But now? Now it felt like any other empty room in Shibusen’s dungeons.

 

Fireworks explode outside the small window, lighting up the room in short flashes. Booms and cheering emanate from the city below. Everyone she knows is down there, celebrating and enjoying themselves on the biggest night of the year.

 

Maka feels hollow. Empty. Even her sorrow feels dull.

 

Maka Albarn numbly stands and opens the door. She looks around the room for a moment, trying to feel: anger or sadness or grief. Anything. She sighs in defeat and leaves, closing the door behind her. Somehow, this feels final, as if this is the last time she’ll be here. While much of her squashes the feeling immediately, reasoning that she’ll return in another few months, a small part of her is relieved that she’s walking away from the pain, even though it feels like betrayal.

 

She looks at her watch, taking a few seconds longer than normal to read and understand the symbols and sticks. 1:23 am. Sooner than she usually leaves: the festival would still be going on for another few hours at least, serving food and drink until nearly sunrise. At the thought of food, her stomach groans and she realizes how horrible she feels, physically. Her head feels like it had split open from all the crying, her body feels sluggish and heavy, and her stomach throbs in hunger. She hasn’t eaten since breakfast.

 

____________________________________________________________________________

 

Arriving at a lonely tamale stand, Maka distractedly orders something and a bottle of water. Even on the fringe of the festival the noise was excessive. The closest concert stage must be at least four blocks away, but the din of the current song was audible, if a bit muddled by the screaming revelers. Maka waits for her food and gulps down her water, emptying it in two swigs.

 

“Number 7!” the vendor calls. When Maka approaches to retrieve her meal, he tries to small talk, clearly bored at being this far away from the remaining party-goers. Maybe this location was better earlier in the night, when children and parents roamed the streets? Regardless, Maka freezes, seemingly unable to think of a response. In actuality, she didn’t even register the sounds he made as words, hearing only unintelligible mumbles and syllables. The shopkeeper rolls his eyes. “I know its a party, but take it easy, okay? Here. Stay hydrated.” He holds out a second bottle of water for her and she takes it, thanking him absently before walking away.

 

Two streets and as many tamale later, she idly wonders if he thought she was on drugs. She must look a mess with how much she’d cried. Another three streets later, she finishes her final tamal and second water and properly disposes of the trash. She continues to wander absently away from the noise and bustle of other people, soon finding herself at the edge of Death City, looking out across the expansive, seemingly infinite desert.

 

She muses that it looks flatter and emptier than ever before, seemingly reflecting her mood. She feels drawn to it, as if being pulled out to sea by a riptide. A foolish person would swim against the current, tiring themself out fighting the pull of the world. A wise person would swim parallel to the beach to escape the current, escaping the problem and continuing their day. No one has rightfully called Maka wise or foolish, because instead of walking back into the city or walking a lap around it, Maka allows the feeling to pull her out into the desert.

 

She walks for an hour, alternating between looking up at the stars and at her feet, between hope and apathy. While looking up at the sky, a star shoots past her vision. The novelty of it strikes her; here is a believed magical, wish-granting moment. She feels a painful glimmer of hope punch through her apathetic depression as an early memory surfaces, of when she was a young child who still trusted her papa.

 

_Maka is on the roof of her childhood home, sandwiched between her mama and papa, looking up at the stars. Her parents are taking turns showing her the constellations. The way that simple, random dots could be interpreted as so many different things blew her mind: how some people would see a dog or a lion or a hand in the same patch of starry sky. While Mama is pointing out gemini and explaining its significance as a star sign, a flash of movement catches her eye. Little Maka gasps and points at where it was, now long gone, and Papa chuckles before asking, “you saw that shooting star, didn’t you, my little angel?” At her vigorous nodding, he continues. “A shooting star is magical, you know. They say that if you close your eyes and wish super duper hard, your wish will come true.”  Maka’s eyes grow wide at the information, as if having just heard the secret answer of the universe. She scrunches up her eyes real tight and wishes under her breath for what she wants most of all in the world: to live in a library._

 

Maka knows now that what her papa said was a lie: an innocent one, but still unfounded words. Despite knowing that wishing can’t change the world, she closes her eyes and tries, wishing, praying, begging to see Crona again. More than anything she’s ever wanted- creating a death scythe, graduating the DWMA, teaching students- she wants this; she wants her Crona. She’s asking for the moon, for the impossible-she knows this- but she still desperately wants it, like a six year old who doesn’t understand why they can’t live in Disneyland. She opens her eyes to the night sky again and her eyes leak pain.

 

Suddenly, the ground gives out from under her and she falls into a pit, tumbling down heels over head until crashing hard on her back, forcing the wind from her lungs. Maka sits up, gasping in a fervent attempt to refill her lungs; soon breath comes to the young woman and she quickly exhausts it again coughing up the cloud of sand birthed by her fall. The particles soon nestle themselves in a new home amongst their siblings and Maka’s cough dies down, the meister breathing evenly for a moment before collapsing onto her back again. Head against the ground, she looks around, surveying her new surroundings.

 

She’s in a hole. The jagged rim of the pit surrounds her tear-stained vision, a patch of the night sky hanging over her like the most beautifully melancholy chandelier. The moon rests in the center of the night sky, unignorable. She sees movement in the sky again and thinks its another shooting star, a taunt by the universe that she could never have her heart’s desire. Rather than a flash though, this is more of a blur, like white blood cells on her retina. It keeps moving, not dying out immediately like a typical meteor, so she blinks the wetness from her eyes and looks again at the amorphous shape falling to the earth. She catches only a few details as it falls freely - dark, undulating, fast, and close - before a great crash sounds.

 

It sounded close.

 

Disbelieving her ears, the trained meister scrambles messily up out of the hole, sensing a monumental change. She stands at the hole’s mouth and looks at the approaching cloud; a wall of faded yellow surrounding the heavenly traveler blocks her vision. As the sand washes over her, dispersed all around, she closes her eyes and thinks forlornly that she should have stayed in the hole until the sand settled. She feels drawn to the solitary object though, the only source of movement and activity in miles, and pushes her feet forward, through the abrasive wind.

 

A couple dozen steps later, the stinging dies down a bit, then stops completely. The world quiets down and, once again, the empty silence of the desert penetrates her mind. She takes a couple more blind steps to give time for the rest of the airborne ground to settle and peels her eyes open, rubbing the crud out of them with her hands. Some sand falls down her shirt and she all-at-once notices how absolutely covered in sand she is: in every fold of clothing, invading every crevice of her body, coloring her hair. It's a highly unpleasant feeling.

 

She brushes her clothes and hair off, shaking much of the sand from her body. She needs a shower before she’ll feel clean and comfortable again, which means she should head back to the city again, soon. Mid brush, she looks up at the immediately recognizable object, horrendously out of place in the Nevada desert, and her blood goes cold She stops brushing herself off and her arms hang limply at her sides as she takes in the sight of an intimately familiar church.

 

La Santa Maria Novella Basilica, in all its gothic splendor, stands tall in the flat desert, as if transported harmlessly and perfectly from Italy. Maka’s mouth opens and closes once, twice, before hanging open in disbelief. Her brain can’t begin to process what she’s seeing, and her feet move toward it before she tells them to. She moves slowly at first, unsure and bewildered, but soon is running, sprinting to the out-of-place gothic building.

 

As Maka reaches the pillars outside the entrance, she stops to catch her breath, doubling over and resting her hands on her knees. She straightens herself and moves to rest her hand against the stone pillar, but as soon as she makes contact, she quickly withdraws her hand. While she expected stone, what she touched was definitely not. It was too warm and sharp, rough in a strange, not stonelike way..

 

This unexpectedness makes her take another look around at the building. Being so much closer, she can make out details previously unseen, like how the entire building is completely black. Further away, she assumed it was the low lighting and lack of contrasting structures, but up close, she can see that every surface, edge, crack, and ornamentation is pitch black, darker than the night sky. Her heart beats faster, either in excitement or nerves; she can’t tell. Starlight brings minor definition to the inky facets of the church, letting her weak human eyes pick up details in the dark. Looking closely at the nearby not-stone, she notices it very slightly moving, flowing and pulsing in a steady, soft rhythm. She removes a glove and brushes her hand over the not-stone, feeling it prickle her skin, almost enough to draw blood. It reminds her of thorns.

 

Her breath catches. The church. Thorns. Moving, black solids. Falling from the sky. Her mind whirs as it tries to put the pieces together in any other order, for this to mean literally anything else as she moves to the church propper, dropping the removed glove, eying the enormous pair or doors in front of her. A blend of foreboding, fear, and hope settle deep in her soul as she stands before these important doors for the third time.

 

She refuses to let herself accept that this can possibly be real. She’s obviously dreaming, or hallucinating, or something because there is absolutely no way her silly little wish from the bottom of a hole actually did this. Maka has spent too long chasing after the impossible to let her hopes get up again. She’s caused herself too much pain to let herself believe again in finding Crona. She knows that she has to open the door to learn anything.

 

A shaky hand reaches for the door and Maka idly wonders if these doors only open inward. The young woman lets her hand rest on the door for an eternal moment as the world silently holds its breath, then painfully pushes it open. Thorns dig into her sensitive hand, biting through her remaining glove as the door silently swings open. Despite the pain, the door feels lighter than it ever had before, as if she’s not alone in opening it.

 

Through the entrance, Maka can see into the church. She doesn’t notice the row of pews or the enormous columns that surround the room. Her mind barely registers the stained glass windows that climb to the ceiling and the occupied cross above the altar. She sees first a pale hand, and she follows that to the back of a figure adorned in clothes the same shade as the basilica, a long, tight dress that hugs every inch of their body. The hem flows smoothly into the floor, the matching colors making it impossible to differentiate between the two. Her eyes move upward to the only patch of color in the room: long, uneven locks of pastel pink hair cascading down their back, like water down a series of waterfalls.

 

Maka feels dizzy and her heart lurches into her throat. She’s had too many dreams where Crona miraculously returns, but none had ever felt this viscerally real, from the pain of her opened hand to the blood pounding in her ears.

 

 _This can’t be real. This can’t be real. This can’t be real._ She repeats this mantra as she takes a step forward, the scuff of her shoe echoing in the empty church. The sound startles the lone occupant before her, who flinched and ducked at the sudden noise.

 

Slowly, hesitantly, as if sharing the fear that this isn’t real, the pinkette shakingly looks over their shoulder and sees Maka in the doorway. They blink. They turn around and look unflinchingly into Maka’s eyes. Their mouth opens and nothing comes out. They blink again, their eyes growing wide.

 

Another dozen steps and Maka stands face to face with them, with only inches separating them. The two gape at each other, studying the other’s face for proof that this is an illusion. The pinkette’s face has changed through age, but its unmistakably the same from all those years ago. They look sharper, without any of the soft pudginess of their youth. Cheekbones ready to cut diamonds stick out under bright blue eyes. Their nose is larger too, lending a sense of strength to an otherwise brittle face. Choppy lilac hair frames their face in their old style of uneven bangs, the occasional uneven lock laying long against their skin, down the bridge of their nose, over a cheek, beside their lips. 

 

They stand before each other, still and confused. The dark-clad figure lifts a hand to hover over Maka’s cheek. Maka reaches her own unsure, dreadful hand to touch theirs and she moves it the final inch to touch her face. It feels warm on her cheek. 

 

It feels warm and solid and so much more real than any dream. With the beginnings of a hopeful smile forming on her lips, she whispers, “Crona?” 

 


	2. Two bruised lovers; the space between is the enemy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crona is real and they're really back with Maka! Isn't that great? They both think so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> its showing up as in a gray box when I preview it, so I hope this posts without that. Otherwise, I'm sorry for that.

Crona looks back down at her, eyes still wide with disbelief or fright, and whispers back, “Maka? Is it really you?”

 

Maka drops Crona’s hand and, before they can ask what’s wrong, wraps her arms around their too-thin torso, pulling them into a tight hug, their shared warmth a cocoon, a sheild from the world. Her head rests against their collarbone and she is struck by how tall they are; Crona’s always been tall, but now they’re a full head taller than her. Crona is stunned by the unexpected contact and their arms hover mid air momentarily before moving to rest stiffly, nervously, against her back. As the hug continues, their first in over 7 years, Crona slowly eases into Maka’s touch, hesitant hands growing comfortable on her back, cheek pressing onto her scalp, muscles relaxing in turn until the two meisters stand as one, flush against the other. Maka sniffles a bit. She’s out of tears for the night, but feels such relief that she can’t fully contain it. “I missed you,” she mumbles into their soft chest. 

 

As she prepares to end the hug and extract herself from Crona’s arms, their long, lanky body suddenly shakes with a sob. She pulls her head back and looks at their face. Its scrunched up, eyes pressed tightly closed and lips forced together by teeth, and Maka can tell they’re trying not to cry. She feels a rush of compassion and comforting instinct, moves her hand to the back of their head, and embraces them more deeply, pulling their head into the crook of her neck. They tense momentarily, but then melt into her, letting the tears and emotions flow. She whispers soft reassurances to them, wanting to show that she still cares, that her feelings toward them haven’t waned. “Let it out,” “I’ve got you,” “I’m here,” and other assurances float from her lips to Crona’s ears as they shake and cry into her. After seven years of isolation, they need all of her comfort and understanding. Though she doubts she can relate to what being the moon was like, she knows she has to try to understand and to comfort them through the pain.

 

She holds them for half an hour as they intermittently hang limply like a sack of potatoes, clutch her tightly like she’ll slip away otherwise, and try to control their tears. Eventually they succeed at the last one and pull away from her: just enough to look at Maka without letting go. They wipe at their eyes with their hands and sniffle loudly. Maka takes a handkerchief from her pocket and hands it to them. They blow their nose into the white fabric, staining it irrevocably black. 

 

“You *sniff* your hair is *snort* diff’rent” they force out, and she’s not sure if its a question or an observation, but its true either way. What used to be long twintails is now a more manageable pixie cut, short and completely off her neck. 

 

“I cut it a couple years ago. It got a bit…” she pauses, thinking back to when her hair was last long. 

 

_ It was two years after the Battle of the Moon. All of her research into black blood was useless. She and Stein were unable to make any progress. Tsar Pushka, Feodor, and the Ukrainian town were all still stuck in the limbo of mad blood, and the moon was unapproachable by almost any means, the madness it passively exudes is so potent. She succeeded in getting to it by flying on Soul, but after barely a minute he had to leave to avoid being consumed by madness, the moon influencing his black blood. Every turn she took led into an eventual dead end and she fell into depression. She lived in the lab at this point and had only seen one human in the last month: Franken Stein. She spent most of her time watching petri dishes or a blank spot on a wall, finding nothing important in either, and hadn’t seen the inside of a shower in over three weeks.  _

 

_ Stein came into the lab one day with Marie and Maka’s friends, all of whom were visibly pained to see her in such a state. Death nearly vomited when he laid eyes on her, sickened by her uncleanliness, but swallowed it down when Liz reminded him that that would lead to vomit on the floor. The girls of the group kidnapped her from her nest in the corner and forcibly cleaned her in the nearest bathroom in the adjacent house. Patty scrubbed her skin with soapy loofas while she protested and fought, prompting Tsubaki and Liz to hold her in place, easily overpowering her while Marie tried to shampoo her hair. She was having no success running the product through her matted, unruly hair and soon brought scissors to her head, lopping limp locks while apologizing. After that, Maka gave up and let her girl friends clean her body while her boy friends cleared out her nest. When she was clean and dressed, Death touched up her hair while Stein and Soul laid out conditions for future lab use and forced her to return to the apartment. _

 

“...unmanageable,” she finally settles on. “Does it look okay?” she asks, a little self concious. 

 

They nod- a relief- and blow their nose into her handkerchief again. Sufficiently snot-free, they hold it out in return to Maka and she gingerly grabs it with her gloved hand, not wanting to touch the mucus directly, and tosses it behind her, into the wind, while Crona is distracted, looking around at the open desert. 

 

Wait. Open desert? 

 

She looks all around her and finds no trace of the enormous basilica that previously surrounded them. Nothing was above her or under her foot, no pews or pulpit or bell above, only open sky and desert sand. 

 

“Maka, where’s the church?” Crona asks her, as if reading her mind. 

 

“That’s what I was wondering,” she says. “Wasn’t that you? I thought the church was made of black blood.” That was her initial hypothesis, but now she’s not so sure. 

 

She grows concerned when they don’t answer her, instead continuing to look around at the desert, seemingly lost. They crouch down and gingerly poke the sand, their hand recoiling at first contact. Slowly they poke the ground again, spreading their hand at the contact and pressing long fingers into the shifting, tiny rocks. The sand covers their hand and they lift some into their palm, bringing it to their face in study. She worries about what they’re doing, why they’re diddling in the sand. Suddenly they stand, letting the sand fall from their hand, and study the horizon around them, eyes wide in disbelief and possibly fright. Their gaze eventually comes to rest on the sky-stabbing spires of Shibusen, the only visible part of Death City from this far into the desert. Their eyes dart skyward, toward the inky black moon, a void in the sky. Something seems to click inside Crona’s head and they turn to face Maka once more. Put off by their strange ritual, Maka prepares herself for their next words, the silence hanging over her like a guillotine in the Death Room: probably safe, but still worrisome.

 

“This isn’t the moon,” they say blankly, as if the statement is too absurd to take in. 

 

Maka can barely hold in a bark of laughter; Crona doesn’t need to think she’s making fun of them. She’s relieved that her worries were for naught. “No, its not,” she says with a gentle smile, shaking her head. “We’re outside Death City.” Crona looks awestruck by her words, like they had just heard the meaning of life from a winged circle with a lion’s head and too many eyes. They look around again with their wide eyes, excitedly taking in as much of the world around them as they can, but soon they look at her again, staring into her soul with their deep, bright blue eyes. Her pulse quickens under their excited, innocent eyes. She takes their hand in hers and softly says, “welcome home.”

 

She immediately commits to memory the expression they make upon as her words sink in. They light up like a Christmas tree; their dark eyes twinkle in the starlight, tears of joy beginning to fall despite them just having cried. Tense shoulders sink in relief. Their mouth turn up into the most beautiful smile she had ever seen, a cactus flower borne into dry desolation but strong and beautiful in spite of it. The barest hint of white enamel peeks out from behind their lips and Maka thinks she could look at that face forever and not get bored. 

 

“I knew you would come back for me. I believed in you every second I was trapped and you rescued me.” They get a distantly happy look on their face, like they’re remembering something precious, and continue. “Just like when you saved me underneath the school, you pulled me out of the madness. You never give up.” Their voice drops to a reverent whisper. “Maka, you’re amazing.”

 

Maka’s face twists, shifting from joy and awe to awkward confusion, uncomfortable at the misplaced trust. She hates that she can’t take credit, that she has to break this to them, but she can’t lie to them and let them think she’s responsible for their miraculous egress. “But I didn’t do anything. I tried- Death I tried everything- but nothing I did worked. Everything I could think of was useless. Stein and I did everything we could think of, but ran into nothing but dead ends. Our research was useless. I never gave up, but nothing worked.” Maka's voice cracks. “Every time we thought we had a breakthrough with black blood, we were wrong; we couldn't even make any more since Medusa’s lab was destroyed. I didn't save you. I failed,” she finishes in a tiny, desolate, pitiful voice.

 

Crona mirrors her expression and a tense silence descends on the lone couple. To hear that Maka, the bravest, smartest, kindest person in the world  _ failed _ ? It's inconceivable. If anyone other than Maka had said those words about her, Crona would accuse them of lying. But to hear the heartbreak and pain in her voice, to hear her suffering because of them, it tears a hole in their chest. They have to say something, anything,  so that she knows it's not her fault, that she didn't fail or let them down. 

 

“But you did save me,” they assert. “Even if you didn't bring me back here, you saved me every single moment I was on the moon. You gave me meaning, a reason to keep going while I was alone. Thinking about you was my only solace from the crushing madness around me, my only tether to the light while drowned by darkness. I would have dissolved in the black blood without you. My memories of us are all that held me together in the loneliness, your promise to come back for me, your belief that I'm somehow worth your time, was all that I had. You're the reason I still exist, Maka, so I don't care if you weren't the one to rescue me; you still saved me.” 

 

Maka is stunned. She knew they wouldn't be angry at her for failing -they're much too forgiving and selfless for that- but she could never bring herself to fully hope for them to still be so strongly devoted to her. She doesn’t agree with their words, but the emotion behind them makes her heart sing with joy and she feels warmth growing deep in her soul, thawing her dark, icy shell of pain like the spring sun melting the winter ice from a pond. She had somehow forgotten how startlingly genuine Crona could be, how intensely their words make her feel. 

 

She wants to know how Crona was freed from their inky prison, since apparently neither she nor they were culpable, but for now Maka can let the question of how Crona is back remain unanswered. Her scientific drive was never that concerned with the truth, despite her lab partner’s devotion to truth-seeking; Maka was only ever concerned with getting Crona back. She’s got them now, so truth be damned. Crona’s here and she’s never letting them go again. The ‘how’ isn’t important right now. 

 

“Okay,” she says in happy defeat, unwilling to disagree with them. “You’re here now, and that’s all I really need. Let's just be happy about it.” Crona gets a determined look on their face and nods seriously, as if she just assigned them an epic quest. She takes their hand in hers and sets off toward Death City. “I've got so much to catch you up on,” she says, excited to tell them about her life, to catch Crona up on everything they’ve missed in the last seven years. “Gosh where do I even begin? Oh!, I know; I teach at the academy now...” and with this she launches into an abridged telling of the last couple years, telling them about her class, where their old friend group ended up, her and her papa’s improved relationship, Stein and Marie’s marriage and kids, the improved relations between the Witch Coven and the DWMA, and all manner of other domestic things, wanting to keep the conversation off the heavy topics of the moon and the months leading up to that fateful battle. Crona asks many questions at the start, but their queries slow as she continues, and a strange look, bordering between concern, confusion, and introspection, decorates their face intermittently as she talks. Maka gets the urge to ask about it, but she doesn’t, sure that its just overwhelmedness from so much new information, so she steers the coversation towards something familiar, from their earlier years.

 

“...which reminds me of that time Patty and Black*Star got into an espresso-drinking contest.” She looks up at the dark swordsman with excited eyes. This memory is from before Medusa took Crona, during their stay at the DWMA, so hopefully it’ll be easy to hear. “Do you remember that?”

 

Crona smiles at the memory. “I think so. Tsubaki and Liz had to talk them down after the eigth one, right?”

 

“Yes!” she says, happy and grateful and excited all at once that they remember it, that the distant, contemplative look is gone, that they’re smiling again. “And then they started arm wrestling-”

 

“-and when Patty lost, she got mad and threw him over her shoulder-”

 

“-and sent him through the window!”  The pair of meisters laugh into the open desert night, clutching their sides and leaning on each other. When they calm down enough to properly stand, they resume their leisurely walk towards Death City. 

 

Maka can’t ever remember feeling quite this light before, like the spring in her step has returned all the more powerful for its hibernation and threatens to launch her through the air. Its like those foreign, confusing feelings she felt for them when she was younger, but stronger now that she knows what it is. It isn’t obsession, or believing, or friendship, but rather all of those things and more. 

 

It’s love.

 

Maka’s grigori soul threatens to consume her in wings of pure joy and set her adrift on breezes of relief and contentment. 

 

“What's your favorite memory from back then?” she asks. 

 

“Favorite?” they ask with a small frown. “I like all the ones with you, I don’t think I could choose one.” A brief instant later, their face drops in shock and horror. “I- I mean I can! I will! If you want me to I can choose just one.” Crona nervously starts to murmur to themself, ferociously debating between beloved memories to share, scared to choose the wrong one and upset her.  

 

“Maybe I should have phrased that better”, she mutters before saying, louder, “You don’t need to have a single favorite, really. Why don’t you just tell me about a happy time?, a memory you cherish. You can tell more than one, if you want.” Crona still looks wary but has a determined frown in place as they muster the courage to tell the story. After a moment more of deliberating, they start into a retelling of one of the many times their friend group went to the park. 

 

_ They had a small picnic - mostly just snacks from nearby convenience stores - at the pond. Soul, Black Star, and Patty threw frisbee, Kid symetrically fed the ducks, Liz and Tsubaki took a walk, Ragnarok ate too much and took a nap, and Crona and Maka relaxed on a blanket with their socks and shoes off, basking in the calm sunlight. She read a book on how meisters fought before demon weapons became as widespread and Crona’s foot slowly, shyly brushed against Maka’s. Maka smiled at them and rubbed back against their foot, and soon the two were happily playing footsie.  _

 

“I felt bubbly all that week thinking about it,” they finish, nervously eying the blonde. 

 

“I remember that day,” she says. Crona’s face brightens; they hoped this one was real.  This memory is one of the more solid ones, but they weren’t 100% sure that it was real. Crona always knew that Maka was real, but the details could be blurry, and when they started recovering memories after Medusa’s magic brainwashing, everything felt vague and half real, like they were stories Crona had heard somewhere. But after they touched Maka’s face that fateful day, when she reconfirmed that they were both real, the memories flooded back. Remembering everything was intensified by the emptiness of the black blood around them acting as a projector for their thoughts; with nothing to see, their eyes played tricks. This also meant that when their imagination dreampt up a new situation, it could be almost as intensely real, and after a while, the line between real and imaginary memories blurred after a while. 

 

““You hardly ever initiated contact,” Maka continues, “so I was really happy when you did. It made me feel special.” Crona can’t help but grin at this; who doesn’t want to make their dream girl feel special? 

 

Already, they’re skirting the edge of talking about the moon. Maka isn’t sure whether she should bring it up, whether Crona would be willing to talk about it so soon, or if she should steer the conversation away. Obviously their imprisonment on the moon isn’t something they want to talk about, but she feels she has to know what they went through up there. As much as she’d like to forget their time apart, she has to try to understand. She decides to ask, but make sure they know they don’t have to talk about it if they don’t want to. 

 

“What else did you do up there?” 

 

She feels them tense and stop beside her. She stops. Crona’s staring at the ground, teeth grit in a tense grimace, a mockery of a smile. Immediately, she feels guilty for bringing up the moon; they definitely didn’t want to talk about it, but after a moment they quietly ask, “do you really want to know?” 

 

“We don’t have to, we can talk about it later-” it feels so good to know there’s a later. “- if you want we can talk about something, anything, else.”

 

Crona weakly holds up a hand to stop her and they slowly take a deep breath, trying to remain calm. They’re going to talk, to let out some of the pain, to trust Maka with this weakness- what are they thinking?! That’s insane!- and they have to remind themself that this is  _ Maka _ and she would never judge or hurt them, that she believes in them, that their bond is still there and that they can deal with this. 

 

They struggle to get going, giving more than a couple false starts, but Maka waits patiently, rubbing her thumb against the back of their held hand. “When I was really young, living with La- with Medusa, she would shut me into a dark, empty room with nothing to eat or drink or do except get punched and yelled at by Ragnarok. It was like that, but… but worse. Ah, Asura was there and Ragnarok wasn’t. He… I haven’t heard f-from him since I killed Medusa.” They shudder from a restrained sob and Maka pulls them in for a hug, one hand weaved gently into surprisingly silky pink hair, holding Crona’s head to her shoulder, and the other hand rubbing their back; their robe is surprisingly rough, scarcely feeling like fabric at all. As much as Maka personally didn’t like Ragnarok, he was an important person to Crona; he was someone who had been with them their entire life, and she knows that missing someone like that is painful. Crona wipes away the quick tears with a hand as they emotionally recenter themself, helped along by Maka’s strong, comforting hands. When they can, they continue. 

 

“The- the Kishin was there instead. It was-  _ he _ was bad. Every moment dragged on and I couldn’t stand it, but…” Crona chews their lip and looks hard at Maka, despite only being able to see the back of her head. It feels weird, what they’re about to say. “He wasn’t as bad as Medusa in some ways. She could send me spiralling with a wave, crush me with a look, but he, his fear, it was… easier?, somehow, like it was a different flavor.” While Medusa’s was razor sharp, direct, and able to cut Crona to the core, Asura’s was a general, baseline unease about everything, turned up to 11. It was like the difference between being stabbed or bludgeoned. “He didn’t make me feel alone like she did; even at his worst, he thrived off of personally tormenting me. It- heh- it sounds strange, even to me, but he validated my existence. The fact he was there hating me was at least proof I existed. I used to think that the real Hell is inside my head, where I can only think myself into anxious circles about how much everyone hates me, and how terrible I am. After a lot of thinking about my life alone and at the DWMA, I came to another conclusion.”

 

Crona is quiet for a long time after that and the embracing pair stood there, alone but for the brush of the Mojave. They pull away enough to look her in the face, but their eyes are pointed everywhere else. There’s a tension in the air, a feeling that Crona isn’t done yet, a tenseness that makes Maka hold her tongue. At a undescernable signal, Crona looks her steadily in the eye speaks again; what they say floors her with how rawly hopeful it is.

 

“Since Hell is in my head, doesn’t that mean that other people are salvation?” 

 

Maka is choked up. She had heard the first half from Death those many years ago, when she grilled him for details about his fight with Crona, and she’s proud beyond belief of the conclusion. She’s so glad they’ve found escape from their isolation, a light in the darkness to follow.  

 

Maka had felt alone before, felt abandoned by her friends and family: like when her papa was cheating, during the divorce, or when she and Soul argued, or when she self-isolated in her obsession to get Crona back, but her loved ones were still there, in the background. They always accepted her without complaint when she went to them. The longest she had ever gone without seeing or talking to another human was a week, in Stein’s lab, when Stein and Marie went on a honeymoon. It was terrible being alone and surrounded by her failures and misplaced hopes for just that long, so she feels she can relate, but it's like the difference between their pain is a pond to an ocean. She knows she can’t possibly take away the pain, but she hopes she can at least make it easier to bare. If being alone is hell, then she’ll show them that they aren’t alone anymore, that they don’t have to ever be alone again. She’ll prove them right, that people really can be salvation.

 

She cups their face with her bare hand, drawing their eyes to hers. “I’m here, with you, and I will always be here. You don’t ever have to worry about being alone again. I’m here” She pulls them closer, draws up on the tips of her toes, and lays her cheek on theirs. She whispers, “I love you,” and the words tickle the sword weilder’s ear. She can feel their face go slack, but she doesn’t know whether its in relief, shock, disbelief, or overwhelmedness. 

 

Maka falls back onto her heels, looks into their wide, astonished eyes, and rests her other hand on their shoulder. “I tried everything I could think of to save you and nothing worked.” She lets out a humorless chuckle, “We even considered dragging the Moon to the Earth, but nothing would attach to the surface. I don’t really understand how and why you’re here now, but I don’t give a damn; I’m too fucking happy to have you back,” she says with palpable relief. “I can’t take away the last seven years, but please know that I still love you, I still want to be your friend, and I won’t let anyone take you away again, I promise.” 

 

Light gray blush colors Crona’s cheeks, flustered by her directness and passion, her absolute conviction. “I want that more than anything, Maka.” The blood slowly leaves their face and is replaced by a far away look. “Has it really been seven years?” they ask.

 

“Seven years today, yeah. It feels like longer, doesn’t it?” she asks, thinking back to all her sleepless nights.

 

“It was an eternity,” they say in a distant, haunted voice. . 

 

For not the first time, she wonders if they had any way to mark the time, or if it lost meaning in the moon. It must have been impossible to see the sun or the earth to tell when a day had passed, and it doesn’t sound like they did, from their earlier story. Those seven years must have truly felt like an eternity. Her heart hurts for them, imagining them trapped in a timeless cage of their own making with the universe’s worst roommate.

 

“Then eternity ends today,” Maka concludes. “Come on, we're almost to the city. I can't wait to show everyone you're here.” 

 

It's true, the row of buildings on the edge of Death City is easily visible from their location, though the silence and solitude of the desert still encompasses them. She pulls their hand, but the rest of them doesn’t follow. Maka looks back. Crona’s free arm is curled around their midsection, their gaze is pointed down, and their lips are pursed in fear.

 

“What if… I shouldn't… I don't belong there, Maka.”

 

“What are you talking about?” She’s too close to getting them back to let them stop here, just outside the gate to civilization. “Of course you belong here.” 

 

“I- I'm not- I'm dirty. I've killed so many people- too many people to be forgiven. Even if Lord Death says it's okay, I know everyone there hates me for what I've done.”

 

She tries to reassure them that it will be okay, that everyone who knows them, everyone who matters, will forgive them, that none of it was their fault and they were forced to kill, but it all falls short before Crona's insecurity and self-loathing. Its not easy, but its never been about doing what’s easy, its about doing what’s worth it; Crona is worth the work. 

 

“It will be okay, I know it will. You saved the world from the Kishin and people are stupid for not realizing it.” When she realizes her words can't budge them, that she can't convince them of their worth so quickly, she racks her brain a way to keep them going. She won’t accept crossing the desert just to stop at the front door, so how can she calm them down, reassure them that everything will be alright, that they won’t be judged and hated? 

 

Suddenly she thinks of soul resonance, the purest, closest bond people can achieve. Surely that will help them build their courage and show them the truth behind her words. Plus, she did promise to show them her courage, her soul resonance, at the first Blood Moon Festival.

 

“Come here, I want to try something,” she says and takes their other hand in hers. “I’m going to resonate with you, okay?” Crona nods. She pulls them close, resting her forehead against their chest, and takes a steadying breath. The thought of resonating with them again, after all these years, excites the short haired meister, and she closes her eyes and quickly, eagerly opens her soul to theirs, lowering her defenses and reaching out to them. 

 

The madness of Crona’s soul rushes over Maka, and she wavers under the crushing waves, but quickly makes up for it. The madness is stronger than last time, but its still the same lonely, hurt, beautiful, perfect soul underneath and knowing that gives her the strength to push her forward, through the razorsharp tar surrounding Crona’s soul. The madness cuts her numbly and viscerally, like a saw through frozen flesh. 

 

She giggles as she loses sight of herself for a moment, but Maka pulls herself together before she can worry Crona and again makes to match wavelengths with them. Despite the increased thickness and potency of Crona’s madness, its easier than the first time; Crona is matching to her at the same time, calling out and giving her direction in the void between souls. 

 

The moment her soul finally touches theirs, the world falls away completely. No longer are they two meisters outside Death City; they float together serenely through an imagined space that’s as real as it is fake, not as a tortured heir of madness and a driven daughter of a scythe dynasty, but as two avatars of the universe finding companionship and comfort in the other’s embrace. In this moment, there is no inner self to find, no pain to flee from, no judgement to worry about, no questions to ask, because in this intimate, infinite instant, they are the answer: love. Maka wishes this could be every moment, that she could be like this with Crona every second of every day, that they would hold her tight and never, ever let her go. She knows it wouldn’t be feasible, but still. 

 

They stand, embracing for an indeterminable amount of time before something interrupts them. A hiccup from inside their shared space, a ripple that becomes a wave that punches Maka’s soul in the face. Maka stumbles, off balance from being forced so suddenly back into her body and out of the halfway space between souls, in pain from being ripped from Crona. Crona trips over their feet and falls on their side, suffering the same effects from whatever split the pair. Crona braces themself on their arms, trying to get upright. Maka’s world spins and tints black at the edges, her blood runs cold and her sweat freezes on her skin. Her knees buckle and she falls to the ground next to Crona. As her vision fades to black, she sees a shape, a sillouette, looming behind Crona as they struggle toward her, panic written on their fading features. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Isn't it nice to hold someone you love? Doesn't it hurt when you have to let go? And isn't it the worst when something forces y'all apart?  
> :)


	3. The Gears of the World Grind our Hearts to Dust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Was last night just a dream? Was any of it real, or just the delusions of a heartbroken woman longing for her lover's touch once more? Is the seal on the moon weakening?  
> Regardless of the answers to these questions, Maka has work.

A shrill alarm sounds and Maka jolts up, tangling herself in her sheets and falling to the floor. She flails to free herself, stands, and looks around the room with a wild, desperate expression. After a few uncomprehending seconds she calms down and realizes where she is, that she’s home, safe in her room. That she wasn’t going mad in the desert. That Crona hadn’t finally returned to her.  _ That last night was just another dream _ , she thinks sadly before her vision goes red. She screams, and punches the nearest wall in anger. The alarm rings as plaster crumbles under the meister’s fierce strike and a hole opens to the building’s entrails. She collapses on her bed and stuffs her face into a pillow, muffling her screams as she lets loose her disappointment. The alarm keeps ringing.

 

She had had more dreams like this than she can remember, but none in the last year, and never any so vivid. The alarm tunnels through the pillow around her ears. The memories of the dream linger perfectly in her mind, from the moment of the crash to her blacking out, she can remember it all. And every “memory” hurts. The alarm blares it's single note proudly. Pissed off, Maka grabs her clock and hurls it across the room. It hits the door and breaks into a cloud of debris which fall to the floor in a pile of potentially pointy pieces. She stares into the silent void left behind by the destroyed alarm, filling it intermittently with heavy breathes before she groans and flops back onto her bed.

 

A knock sounds from outside her bedroom door and Blair’s concerned voice follows. “Maka? You okay in there? I heard a crash.” Usually, Blair would be much more direct in her questioning- cats and curiosity and all that- but even this shameless pussy knows to be gentle with Maka this time of year.

 

She answers in a tight voice, “I’m fine, it was just the alarm clock. Don’t come in.” After a mumbled, unheard “if you say so,” Blair’s footsteps echo away and Maka’s alone again. She sighs and embraces the silence, processing their dream. She decides that she doesn’t have time to think about it yet. Just like everyone else, she has to get out of bed today; she has work. 

 

With a huff, she rolls off her bed, landing nimbly on her feet. She stretches her arms above her head, prompting pops from multiple joints. Looking down, she sees that she’s still in her clothes from last night- not an odd occurrence after a hard night like hers- and that they’re covered in sand- also not an uncommon thing with Death City being on the edge of the Mojave Desert. Maka turns around to check, and, sure enough, her bed is covered in sand too. She makes an annoyed sound, much like one an accountant stuck with fresh numbers to crunch just before they left for the day would make when they realize this means they’ll be late for their nibling’s ballet recital. She makes a mental note to change her sheets when she gets home from work. 

 

For now, she takes a shower, making sure to carefully step over the broken shards of her alarm clock. When she’s clean and fully awake, she returns to her room and dresses in her usual teaching uniform: a black pencil skirt, lilac and white hoops kneesocks, and a lilac button-up shirt under a black sweater vest, no tie. She dons her usual black and white, strappy boots and hurries out of her apartment door, dodging Blair’s curious expression. 

 

Her workday is long and painful. All day she couldn’t help but replay last night’s dream in her head. It all felt,  _ feels _ , so real and vivid and she wants so much to believe it happened, that through some miracle, Crona is back in her life, but she quashes the hope that this is real.  _ It's the same as every other year _ , she thinks to herself. She has to keep it together in front of her class: they’re depending on her to help build a strong foundation of knowledge. She can’t break down in school- Death would worry and make her take time off, and she can’t leave her kids, can’t let them down.

 

So, she pushes down the hope regretfully and carries on with her lesson. 

 

When the lunch hour begins and her class files out of the room, Maka falls into her desk chair, sighs in relief, and lets the stress bleed out of her. Now, when a container empties, something else will inevitably take its place, such as when you pour water from a glass, air takes its place. In this case, when the stress left Maka, her thoughts- her hopes, her fear, her pain, her sorrow- aggressively filled its place.

 

A furrow forms between Maka’s brows and her vision blurs with moisture. She wipes it away with the heel of her thumb before it can fall. She breathes away the tightness in her chest and focuses on the feel of her skirt between her fingers. She counts the desks in front of her: 20, as always. She does everything she can to keep her mind otherwise occupied until she’s safely home. 

 

She won’t be able to keep this up for an hour though, she knows that much from experience, so she decides to see if Liz and Patty are free. Out of the members of spartoi, only Death, Liz, Patty, Maka, Kim, and Jacqueline remained in Death City. Death (formerly known as Kid) is always busy, and Kim and Jacqueline are out of town, travelling around the world on their honeymoon. 

 

A text and a walk later, Maka is sitting outside a restaurant with Liz, Patty, and three plates of pasta. Liz gives her the latest gossip from around the world: she’s grudgingly in charge of communication and joint planning between branches of the DWMA’s forces. When she’s done, Patty launches into a story about one of her kids, Ty, sharing his markers with Mandy even though they’ve been fighting. The younger Thompson sister became a preschool teacher. Maka listens to them talk, engaging every now and again, sometimes sharing a small story about her class or a book she’s reading, but mostly content to just listen and eat, her mind sufficiently distracted. The hour passes quickly and the rest of the day thankfully follows in suit, though the pain looms in the back of her mind. 

 

After an uneventful walk home, she unlocks and opens her apartment door and is assaulted by the purring of a cat. Blair, in cat form, is rubbing against Maka’s legs before she can get her shoes off. Through the rumble of her chest, Blair lauds the universe for Maka’s return, spamming phrases like, “oh I’m so glad you’re back,” and, “I really really  _ really _ missed you.”A smile forms, unbidden, on Maka’s face and she crouches down to pet her. The purring intensifies. Maka’s smile dies prematurely, turning upside down. Her hands stop and become fists, and she sobs, her whole body shuddering as the pain-crastination catches up to her all at once, the pushed away feelings overwhelming her in an instant. 

 

In a puff of smoke, Blair is in her human form and hugging Maka, guiding her face onto the larger woman’s shoulder and rubbing slow circles on her back. Maka clutches her tight, an anchor in the maelstrom of emotion. Over the years, since Soul left for the Death Scythe position in Russia, Blair and Maka have grown closer. Despite finding many of Blair’s habits distasteful, Maka finds comfort in the older woman’s presence, no matter her form. Blair loves knowing she has a home away from the desires of others, because as much as she enjoys the attention, it can be a bit much to have everyone be in lust with her. 

 

The pair remain like this, hugging on the floor of the entrance, for almost 30 minutes, until Maka is tired and languidly rubbing Blair back, still frowning but mellowing out. Her sobs have quieted completely when Blair pulls away, holding the tired teacher’s shoulders and inspecting her face. “Are you okay?” she asks, and Maka gives a weak smile to show she’s fine, or at least will be. Satisfied with what she sees, Blair stands and helps Maka to her feet, then tells Maka about her plans for the evening: dinner and shopping with her newest boyfriend, so she won’t be back until morning.

 

After finally removing her shoes, Maka sits down at the dining room table to start grading papers. She’s got a decent stack of essays on theoretical soul transfer to grade before monday, so she pulls out her work tablet and gets to it, occasionally marking the document with a stylus in correction. A dull two hours pass and Blair is out the door waving goodbye to Maka, wanting to be at the restaurant before sunset. A long moment of diligent work, Maka realizes she’s alone for the first time today. Before just now, she’s had some sort of background noise, the heartbeat of humanity and life, to keep the illusory flame of companionship alive. But now, she’s alone and the idea that she’s truly, purely, deeply connected to anyone seems laughable; after what she had with Crona, everything else feels pale and shallow in comparison. Friends new and old just don’t get her in the same way they did. Even her friendship with Soul, forged strong by strife, is strained more often than not nowadays.

 

Her stomach rumbles, abruptly drawing her out of her head. She feeds the microwave a frozen dinner and gets back the now hot food only minutes later. Food in hand, she gets back to the papers, turning on a lamp to combat the coming evening. The sun has dipped below the buildings of Death City around her, but lingers on the horizon, struggling to stay lit for just a moment longer. She reads and marks with one hand, absentmindedly eating with the other. She finishes the tasteless meal and pushes it to the side. 

 

The monotony of the papers sets a dull rhythm in her head. That, combined with her now full stomach and the exhaustion of a long day, soon sends her to sleep, arms folded on the table, head resting on them like a worn out cherry on top a haggard ice cream sundae. The sun sinks beyond the horizon, its fight for consciousness in vain, and the blacked out moon rises.

A knock on the front door goes unheard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry everyone, just a short chapter this time. I needed a bridge between events and to show Maka's shit and how she barely has it handled. But don't worry, Crona will be back, and with a surprise guest ;)


	4. Hope and Despair: the uncertainty of life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maka has really good friends. She wouldn't be half the person she is without them. Same for all of us.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey y'all! its been a while but I promise I'm still alive and working on this story. Its just so massive that I have to take it slow to make sure I don't accidentally write myself into a terrible corner of plot holes.

Maka’s next day is normal. She's a bit numb from everything, but its fine. With The Anniversary behind her, she can put it out of her mind more. Not entirely though: never could she put them fully out of her head. Like always, there’s the occasional thought of “oh, Crona would like that” when she sees some random cute or fluffy thing and be reminded of their reverent looks of wonder when they saw something wonderful for the first time, and she would have to fight the urge to scream. But for the most part, she does her work, stays on topic during her lectures, and doesn’t let herself think about Crona, or the moon, or the gaping, hungry maw of guilt and pain and regret that threatens to eat her insides and leave her a hollow, bitter shell. Like I said, its just a normal day for Maka Albarn.

 

She thinks nothing of it when Death calls her to the Death Room after classes end; he’d done so many times before: to deliver professional news, to ask advice, and sometimes just to have tea and talk. She appreciates it, grateful for all of Death’s support and friendship over the years: financial, emotional, and professional. He gave her research funding and offered her a job when she needed one. She smooths down her skirt, reapplying the veneer of having her shit together, then walks in to the godly dimension.

 

As always, long, fluffy, white clouds flow along the strange, internal sky. Jagged crosses with too many poles are buried in sandstone, stretching past the horizon, each marking a soul set to rest by a Death God. Since this room doesn’t exist in the same dimension as the rest of the world, it isn’t constrained by the size of the school its in, allowing for the millions of graves. Maka walks along the sole, slate-stone path under the guillotine-torii, approaching Death’s dais, made of impossibly perfect, uniform marble. A fenestrated ring floats in the sky, letting in light from the Nevada sky.

 

Death redecorated a bit since his father’s passing; two identical mirrors are on the platform, evenly angled from the center of the dais, each precisely eight feet tall and half as wide, with ornate carvings of skulls and souls in the mahogany frames. A matching wooden table in the shape of Death’s mask sits in the exact center of the pedestal, the three teeth toward the threshold’s trail. A pot of tea, two cups, and identical covered dishes of sugar cubes and cream sit around the nose-hole of the table. Three blue green pillows are evenly arranged around the top curve of the table’s skull. On the center pillow, at the far end of the table, perfectly centered between the two mirrors, wearing a wickedly jagged black cloak and white skull bolo tie, sits Death.

 

“Maka, it's good to see you,” call Death happily when Maka steps through the final torii. The familiar face of her old resonance teammate, sharper with age and heavier with responsibility, smiles at her. Unlike his father, Death doesn’t wear a mask. He says it's to remind the world that there’s a new God of the world, that the times have changed. “Please, take a seat,” he says as she climbs the stairs. He gestures to the cushion on his right, then stands and moves to the opposite one.

 

“It's good to see you too, Kid.” Maka smiles and sits across from him. Death rolls his eyes at her use of his childhood name.

 

“Kid? Really, Maka, I’m hardly a child anymore. Not even Patty still calls me that,” he complains. He started going by __Lord Death__  as soon as he took the throne, and by now he’s convinced their friends to at least call him Death, but everyone refuses to use the title “Lord” outside of the most strictly professional settings. Maka is the only one who still calls him Kid; she hardly saw the point of changing how she addresses him just because he’s a fully fledged grim reaper.

 

“Maybe not to your face,” she mutters just barely loud enough to be heard.

 

“What was that?,” he fake-threatens in a low voice, a facsimile of the late Lord Death’s infamous warning growl.

 

“Maybe not to your face!,” she shouts in defiance, knowing no one can overhear her here and be bothered by the noise. Death glares at her, but his barely-there smirk betrays his amusement at their familiar game. He can always count on Maka Albarn to recognize, understand, and completely disregard the fact that he’s literally a god, one of the, if not the, most powerful and influential people in the world, and yell in his face. It’s refreshing to know there are still people not scared to yell at him.

 

“It would be a waste to try to change your mind, wouldn’t it?,” he asks, already knowing the answer. She sticks her tongue out at him and Death exhales nasally in laughter. He reaches for the pot to pour the tea quickly and efficiently into the two tall tea cups, a familiar, practiced motion. He passes a filled cup to Maka. There is silence as they both add cream and sugar to their tea: for Maka, just a bit of each: for Death, 8 sugar cubes and no cream. She sips her tea as he stirs his abomination. The sugar takes forever to dissolve fully, but he’s mastered the art of stirring without clinking against the cup so the process is only visually and viscerally horrifying. Maka takes a sip of her tea (tea that is tea and not liquid candy) and unsuccessfully tries to ignore his atrocity, just like every other time the two have had tea together.

 

When he’s finally finished mixing his monstrosity, he sips and asks, with forced casualness, “How are you doing today?”

 

Maka’s gut drops and her eyes stick to her teacup, refusing to look up at him. She knows that’s why he calls her here this time of year - to check up on her, to scrutinize her mental state, to see if she’s well enough to teach - but she let her guard down when yesterday came and went without a talk, but she still should have known. He does this every year, hovering over her like she’s going to suddenly slip backwards into a depressive spiral and lock herself in a lab for a month again.

 

“I’m fine,” she says tersely. His eyebrows draw together in concern. She hates when he looks at her like that, like she needs looking after. Like she’s weak. He’s wrong; she keeps herself together every day in front of her kids, when its important. She never lets how she really feels every single fucking day show through. She doesn’t need his pity. When he opens his mouth to say something, she interrupts him before he can get his second word out. “I said I’m fine,” she snaps. “I can still teach. You don’t have to worry about me. I’m not that weak.”

 

“Maka,” his voice comes out soft and concerned, almost hurt. “You’re more than just staff to me; you’re my friend. I worry about you.”

 

“I don’t need you to worry about me, I can handle myself well enough.” She’s frustrated. Why won’t he trust her to handle her own shit? She’s an adult. She hasn’t done anything lately to deserve this scrutiny.

 

“I know you can. I just want to help, to be here for you.” Yep. That’s definitely pain in his voice. Now she feels a little shitty. She just snapped at one of her oldest friends just because he’s concerned about her. She sighs and apologizes. A brief sip of tea later, she opens up a little bit.

 

“Things are… they’re bearable but rough, honestly.” Maka’s face slumps in thought, looking much like she would if she were having trouble fixing a pair of glasses with a tiny screwdriver that can’t seem to fit into the teeny screws. “I thought it would get easier, but it doesn’t. Not really. It still feels like they’re here, sometimes.” She swears she can feel their presence every now and then, like a phantom on the periphery of her senses, nothing more than the sensation of being watched and knowing its them. Nothing verifiable or constant. Probably caused by stress, according to Stein.

 

“Are you getting enough sleep?,” Death asks. She hesitates and something shows on her face. Being one of her oldest friends and confidants, he somehow understands. “Are the dreams back again?”

 

“Yeah,” she answers, a little despondent as the memories of dreams old and new rush through her head.

 

He takes a long sip from his cup, patiently waiting for her to continue.

 

“Every night this week except last night.” She doesn’t bother explaining the contents of the dreams. He knows. “They were so intense, especially Thursnight’s. I don’t even remember getting home from the school after… you know. It felt so vivid, so __real__. I really, actually thought Cr-” her voice breaks. “ _ _They__ were back.” If she were being honest with herself, she still, deep down, feels like they’re back.

 

“You two shared a powerful, special bond. It makes sense that losing it would leave deep, lingering scars. As time marches onward, I’m sure it will get easier, eventually.”

 

She wishes he was right, that it got easier. Some days its easier to ignore and trudge through the day, but the loss still feels fresh, even after these seven long years. If it’s supposed to get better, then why are so, so many days still so painful? Sometimes she wishes she could just forget it all - from the night at the church to the day on the moon - but then she feels guilty about having such thoughts, like she’s betraying Crona’s memory, but damn it she wants the pain to stop! Surely Crona would want her to be happy however possible, to live a normal, healthy, good life, but the idea of doing that alone, without them by her side? It makes her sick. It feels wrong even thinking about that sort of life. No matter how much she wishes the pain could be in her past, she can’t bring herself to toss out the heavenly hopes and domestic dreams that bring her such sadness.

 

“I just miss them so much.” Her voice comes out small and tinny, on the verge of tears. “It's been __seven years__  and I miss them so much. It feels like my heart’s been ripped out every time… every time I think about them. It's not fair!,” she screams, wetness welling in her eyes, held back purely by strength of will. She breathes heavily for a moment, struggling to get herself under her own control again; she’s not a crybaby, she’s Maka g _ _oddamn__ Albarn, creator of the Last Death Scythe and Kishin veteran, and she’s above falling into tears at school, so she is going to pull herself together and act like a mature, fully functioning adult!

 

Death, thankfully, focuses on the tea instead of the spectacle she’s making of herself and prepares a second cup for them each. The pair sip on their cups in silence, and, after another long moment, Death starts into another conversation and they chat about lighter topics, moving from Stein and Marie’s growing family to the local witches’ coven to school gossip, just hanging out for a while, letting the earlier intensity fade. Suddenly, the right-most mirror flashes and an obnoxious k-pop song blares from it, louder than a stoner’s hot boxed car; Maka and Death flinch at the sudden intrusion, and the latter calls out to answer it and stop the painfully loud noise.

 

“Heya baus,” says Tezca Tlipoca in his growly, rattling voice. “OwO, what’s this? A visitor?” he asks, noticing Maka.

 

“Tezca! I told you not to interrupt us,” Lord Death scolds.

 

“Yeah yeah, I dig you, but Franky’s got to go home, like ASAP and I know you’d rather not get Marie nagging you about her hubby abandoning his fam. So can he get his groove on or nah?” Death shoots Maka an apologetic look, then gives Tezca the go-ahead.

 

With an artificial buzz, courtesy of the mirrornet’s resident furry, Tezca’s face disappears and is replaced by Stein’s. The scientist’s eyes rove over the room and he smiles at the sight of Maka. “Lord Death, Maka, how are you?”

 

Maka flashes a awkward smile, still a bit caught off guard at the previous caller. No matter how many times she interacts with Tezca, she’s always put off by his odd mannerisms. “We’re fine. Go ahead with your report,” Lord Death answers for the both of them.

 

Stein’s features smooth over professionally and he speaks. “We have a development with the celestial disturbance from the other night. We’ve set up equipment next to the crater and have begun testing the surrounding area for any anomalies. We’ve found something; somehow, the ground has a faint, strange soul wavelength. Its not a whole soul, or even part of one, best I can tell, but it’s there all the same. We aren’t sure yet what this means, but it may be the influence of a witch. With your approval, I can arrange for someone to get in contact with the local coven and see if any of them had something to do with it.”

 

“Very well. Please arrange to do just that. Is there anything else?” Stein shakes his head and Death dismisses him. The mirror returns to its usual reflective surface and the young god turns back to his friend. He opens his mouth to apologize for the interruption, but Maka interrupts him.

 

“What’s this about a celestial disturbance?” she asks seriously, every gram of her being focused on him. Death hesitates, not wanting to get Maka’s hopes up like she used to at every meteor shower or astrological event. In the end, he can’t deny the intensity of her attention.

 

“Wednesnight, several amateur astronomers saw something fall from the sky. I sent out a team to investigate and they found a small crater, but nothing in it. The crater itself is weird: too shallow and cold. We are working out what made the crater, but so far we have nothing.” He looks at her appraisingly, searching for a sign that telling her this wasn’t a mistake. In Maka, hope spikes at his words, hope that her dream was real, that Crona made that crater, but Maka squashes it ruthlessly, throwing up dozens of rationalizations of why it couldn’t possibly have been Crona. Death already didn’t want to tell her, probably for this exact reason.

 

“oh,” she says in a small voice. She swallows to loosen the lump in her throat. She refuses to cry. “I’m sure it was nothing.” She takes an absent sip of her tea; she doesn’t taste it or feel the heat. Death says something, but Maka doesn’t hear him. She focuses on not crying.

 

“-aka? Maka, are you alright?” He’s looking at her with worry, like he regrets telling her, like it's his fault she got her hopes up, like that information should have been kept from her. Like she’s fragile. Weak. She hates that look. It makes her want to punch something.

“I’m fine. Are we done here?” Her voice is terse and Death looks saddened by it. Nevertheless, he lets her leave, dismissing her with a sad nod. She stands and walks away. Halfway through the torii path, she abruptly turns, lets out an angry roar, and slams her fist into a wooden pillar. It doesn’t budge. Pain blossoms in her hand, but she ignores it in favor of being pissed off: at Death’s careful worry, at her own inability to accept the bleak truth, at Medusa for stealing Crona from her, at the world for celebrating Crona’s imprisonment, at herself for wanting to give up. She can’t decide what to be mad about, so she plays it safe and rages against everything.

 

Maka stomps the rest of the way out of the Death Room and through the empty, post-school hours hallways. She scowls all the way to the school’s gym, hurriedly changes into the exercise clothes kept in her locker, wraps her fists, and sizes up on a punching bag. Without warning, she starts to pummel the heavy bag with hooks and straights, violently knocking the bag back and forth in a jarring rhythm. Her arms burn and her fists sting with the impacts.

 

She stops only when her arms grow too heavy to hold up and her lungs burn painfully. The bag sways a final time when she grabs it to balance herself, exhausted and breathing raggedly. She focuses on the pain in her hands and chest, forcibly ignoring the twin voices of hope and despair in her head, and makes her way to a treadmill, setting it to a fast jog, not bothering with stretching or warming up, already heated and past the point of caring about such trivial things like her body. She runs, letting the repetitive motion wipe away her mind. She runs long and hard, until running isn’t enough, when the ache in her calves and the burning in her lungs no longer drowns out her thoughts. She stops and switches to another machine - this time weights - and pushes a different part of her body in hopes to again drive out her anger. This cycle of pushing until she can’t push any more then punishing a different part of her body continues for well over an hour, until she physically can’t move. She collapses on a bench, laying down on the uncomfortable, sweat infused wood, blocking the light with an arm draped over her eyes, chest heaving and skin sweating. Everything hurts and she knows it’s only a taste of the soreness she’s in for tomorrow. She welcomes the distraction of aching muscles: anything that’ll keep her mind silent.

 

When her breath has calmed, she stands and stumbles to the changing room to rinse off the layer of fresh sweat in the empty communal shower. The hot water soothes her overworked muscles and fills her with enough energy to get her home in the late afternoon, whereupon she collapses into her bed almost immediately, staying up just long enough to change into pajamas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is another mostly filler chapter to set up the next big thing, but I hope its enjoyable anyway.  
> Also, I headcanon that after Tezca Tlipoca lost his body, he got big into internet furry culture. Ignore my terrible attempt at writing this.


	5. The Swords Remain Inside, Despite their Intangibility. They never stop bleeding.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crona wakes up, lost and confused, like almost every other day of their life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yall im so sorry its been *checks clock* THREE MONTHS?! since i last posted, but i assure you i'm not abandoning this story. My beta reader and I got to talking and plotted out a better, more fulfilling ending to this, so i had to replan and rewrite a bunch, then I got caught up in writing future parts instead of this part, so its just been a big ole clusterfuck of new ideas and words. I hope i dont leave yall hanging this long again, and ill try to make my updates more often  
> anyway, i hope yall enjoy

Darkness.

 

It surrounds them, pressing in on them, filling their insides and rotting them out. The darkness fills their senses with void, robbing them of the world they once inhabited. The pitch oiliness has long since entered every orifice, every hole, every pore, and subsumed them entirely. What’s left of their core is derelict. They would feel the taint of unclean deep within their soul, if they hadn’t long forgotten the feeling of being clean.

 

__Its fine. I’m used to it._ _

 

They had lived their whole life in darkness. For the longest time, everything was a shade of darkness, an abyss of despair filled only with fear and pain and hate. Every blurry moment of consciousness was utter hell, punctuated only by merciful nothingness, moments when they could shut off and break way from their self: mind body and soul.

 

But, for the briefest instant, there was light. A place where the sun shined, where there was laughter and kindness and joy, where they felt safe and protected for the first time in their life.

 

Too bad Mother snuffed it out, just as she did everything that could have been good for them. Mother didn’t allow for moments of joy or calmness or safety; those luxuries did nothing to further her plans, to bring them closer to their destiny, and thus were venomously destroyed. Mother had a plan, always, and they were only a marionette for her to control, only a means to an end, a pawn on a board.  

 

__That’s why I had to kill her. She stole my light and gave me Nothing._ _

 

Again they were plunged into the sea of pitch, deep enough for the pressure to crack their skull and turn their insides to slurry. Burning cold lances through their whole self and the haunted screams of their victims echo endlessly in their ears: nothing to insulate them from the damned prison they created for themself, not even their supposed “prisoner.”

 

It’s almost funny, that, when they made this cell, they fancied themself the warden and the Kishin Asura their prisoner. For a while, he tore at them, screamed his mind out, threatened obscenities, and did everything he could to torture them, to liquefy their brain with fear and scoop out the insides. But none of this bothered them; they were already hollow and in pain. Instead, it made them feel strong, in a perverse way, that they held such power over __The Kishin__ , that they were able to hold him down, that they could make him suffer.

 

But eventually, abruptly, Asura grew quiet. One moment, the screaming threats just, stopped. Maybe he knew that his struggling only reinforced his jailer’s conviction. Maybe he grew bored. Maybe he succumbed to the black blood and assimilated, becoming one with the liquid prison they’re both drowning in. Who could tell? In this realm of dreamless nightmares, no one can hear you scream.

 

A feeling like a sleeping limb being cut open wakes them. The stony ground presses hard against their back and a chill runs through them. Their eyes open in time to blearily catch the fleeting, final, pastel breathes of the sunset before the sky fades to black, starlight starting to peek through the city’s ambient lantern-light. The young night is still, windless, and Crona takes in their surroundings. The tall walls of two buildings sandwich them on either side. A lit lamppost stands tall, askew at the mouth of the alley, casting long, oblique shadows between the buildings. Tidy trashcans and an open dumpster are bunched together next to a door that presumably leads into the building to their left. A rat scurries out from under the dumpster and disappears in the shadows behind the trashcans.

 

Crona pushes against the rough, stone ground to stand, the rock gritty underneath their palms. They teeter as they right themself, and place a hand against the wall to stabilize. After shaking loose the dark fuzziness of their vision, they move to the street with cautious, timid steps, scared of being spotted by a stranger. They don’t want to deal with other people right now; they aren’t sure how much they would be able to hold back their conditioning and not outright kill whomever they come across. They got lucky last night, being able to sneak up to Maka’s apartment and slip away unnoticed. She didn’t answer the door, but Crona can’t bring themself to mind much; she’s busy with her life and they can’t expect her to drop everything immediately just because they’re around. Even if being apart from her makes their stomach twist anxiously, just knowing she exists near them was enough to settle their nerves most of the night.

 

Crona hopes their luck will hold up tonight as well and they’ll spend the night unbothered. Peeking out of the alley, it seems that it might; the street is empty as far as they can see. Unfortunately, they don’t recognize their location. They have to still be in Death City - that much is obvious by the towering structure that is the DWMA. Tracing their steps from last night is a fruitless exercise, as the only thing they remember is trying Maka’s door and waiting patiently - anxiously - for what seemed like hours.

 

But whatever. That’s not important. What __is__  important is finding Maka again.

 

The biggest problem is that they don’t know where her apartment is in relation to their current location. Luckily, they do know the path to it from the school. With this in mind, they start walking uphill, toward the school. For a moment, flight is considered - its so easy now, to sprout wings of blood and soar above the world like a dragon; they barely even notice the ripping agony of it anymore - but dismissed quickly; flying would mean a greater chance of being spotted and harassed. Instead, they decide to stick to the back streets as much as possible. Crona gets turned around more than once and has to reroute their path to the school. Driven by fear - but also hope - they press flat into the nearest shadow at the faintest hint of human sounds, only crossing through the light when they’re certain they won’t be spotted, slowly but surely making their way downtown.

 

They never stop for long, scared of being seen through their meagre, temporary hiding spots behind trashcans and bushes and closed-for-the-night kiosks; when their feet stop, their mind starts, whispering dread and fear. __You’ll never find her again. You’re lost, just give up. She doesn’t want you. They’ll find you.__

 

Eventually, blessedly, the world starts to look familiar and they can distract themself with memories, the first being a storefront. They don’t just see a door and a sign, but instead __the place where Crona once saw Maka out and about, mustered up the courage to wave to her, and she lit up and ran over to say hello.__  Or a street corner becomes _ _the place Maka taught them how to safely cross a street.__ A road name, “Barley Street, sounds kinda like “Harley” and that reminds them of __when Soul took them and Maka riding around town in his motorcycle. They were crammed in the sidecar together, since Soul didn’t want anyone else driving his bike, and Maka didn’t want to leave Crona alone like that.__ It was so nice to sit behind her, trusted as a shield.

 

These memories - held dear despite their holes - surface more and more as they elevate. It is nice to be in a familiar place again. They're so caught up in these memories of Maka and friends that they forget to be so incredibly careful about not being spotted. They round a corner without checking and ram face-first into something tall. Their ass hits the pavement and Crona looks up at what they collided with.

 

Looming over them is a tall, long, billowy man wrapped in scarves, back-lit by a flickering light over a door. His face is almost familiar, like they saw half of it for a panel or three. Crona scuttles backwards until their back is against a wall. The almost-familiar stranger approaches Crona as if on a rail; their feet don’t move but they are soon eclipsing Crona once again. Their instincts scream at them to attack, to kill, to cut down the intruder of the night. Crona summons Ragnarok to their hand and slashes upward in an attempt to cleave the enemy in two, but, to their shock, their hand is holding nothing but air; Ragnarok, their weapon partner, their oldest companion, is gone. Defenseless, panic sets in; what can they hope to do without a sword? Their eyes tear away from their open, empty palm and move back to the enemy; or at least, they try to.

 

He’s gone, vanished without a trace. Unnerved and shaking, Crona curls into themself, pulling their knees to their chest and locking their arms around their shins. Their eyes move wildly between the two conjoining alleyways, constantly checking for the disappearing man and other approaching danger. Time’s march slows as the fear and worry eat Crona’s brain and reduce them to a puddle of instinct and anxiety.

 

Crona isn’t sure how long they’re immobilized by by the fear - hours could be seconds; they can’t tell after living for so long where time has no mark - but eventually, ever so slowly, inch by inch, they peel back the layers of fear that surround them and open themself back up to the world. They stand, Maka in mind, and continue their journey. On this leg, they’re ever more cautious, unwilling to let another surprise encounter happen; they check around every corner, inside every garbage can, underneath every dumpster. Other than a group of squirrels, which scatter upon discovery, Crona finds nothing.

 

The quiet is uncomfortable. It smothers them in fiberglass and sets them on edge. It feels like a storm is approaching, the change in pressure, the unplaceable scent of oncoming tempest. Their senses are all pushed to the max, searching for any stimulus to latch onto; known fear is preferable to the alternative.

 

Crona misses Ragnarok. He was always there to help drown out the silence, to give Crona something immediate to latch onto, even if it was pain and scorn. He was stuck with them, unable to leave them no matter how much he tried thanks to Medusa’s machinations. Crona had always felt guilty about being the weapon’s prison, so they accepted his abuse as penance, but there was always a undercurrent of gratitude. He was a jerk and a jackass and a bully, but he was there. Even if Medua’s hardly acknowledged them, even if the world was scary, Ragnarok wouldn't ignore them. They were stuck together, like two literal peas in a literal pod.

 

But now? Now he’s silent and he won’t answer their call. Crona doesn’t want to think about why that could be, doesn’t want to even consider that he might be gone forever, drenched too heavily in madness and drowned at the bottom of the lunar sea, swallowed and dissolved by the rot. If they let themself thing about it, they might not be able to stop thinking about it, not be able to stem the rush of regret and guilt that breaks through their meagre mental walls. Crona tries to focus on their quest, on finding Maka, to keep their feet moving. They’ve only got the night to get there and they’ve got no clue how much time is left.

 

They have to hurry.

 

They have to find Maka; that’s the only thing that matters.

 

Peeking around from behind a corner, Crona sees the back of a figure silhouetted by the light of a lamppost. Familiar wheat-gold hair glows, a stark contrast to the deep pitch of her long jacket. Crona blinks hard, not believing their eyes, but when they open again, she is still there. A gentle wind brings her tresses to life, animated and flowing beautifully, and reveals her face.

 

Maka.

 

Crona tries to call out to her but the words stick in their throat. They swallow and try again, prompted when she walks away, their words reaching her as she starts to round a corner. She turns to them and smiles. A desperate, relieved grin splits Crona’s face as well. She’s here! Maka is here! They found Maka!

 

Just as the elation of the end their quest sets in, Maka disappears behind the street corner. The color drains out of the city at her departure so Crona rushes after her. With a dash, they violently take the turn in time to catch a glimpse of Maka’s coat tail fluttering around another corner, and an unpleasant game of chase is begun: Crona trailing Maka, moving based on glimpses of her shadow, desperately calling out to her, uncaring of who sees or hears them: they found Maka; nothing else matters.

 

No matter how fast they run, they don’t seem to close the distance, only ever able to catch glimpses: a strappy boot, a golden twintail, her gloved hand. As the chase goes on, the world grows darker; the buildings grow taller, more brutal and oppressive, stretching over their head like canyon walls. The streetlamps dull, as if the light is being siphoned away, eaten by encroaching darkness.

 

“Maka, please wait! I don’t like this!” Crona shouts after her with panic in their voice. The blonde miester either doesn’t hear or doesn’t care because she doesn’t slow.

 

Suddenly, the buildings around them disappear and they’re exposed in the liminal space between the city and its park. Open. Visible. __Vulnerable__. Crona drops like a rock to their hands and knees and crawls the rest of the way to the nearest group of bushes. Secure in their newfound hidey hole, surrounded by tangled yet kept growth, they rise up - just above the leaves - and search for spectators and Maka. No spectators, but they see Maka’s figure poking out between trees in a grove. She beckons them, a siren’s call pulling them into the dark.

 

Crona feels drawn to her, a moth to the flame, driftwood caught in the tide, a rock falling to Earth. But their feet won’t move. There’s too much open space; its too dangerous to cross. Worst case scenarios flit through their head and rattle around their brain. Their head hurts. Maka calls to them again. Her voice is melancholy, forlorn, aching at Crona’s absence at her side.

 

Still, Crona’s feet won’t move. The risk is too great; what if they’re spotted and attacked? They want nothing more than to be with her, but they just can’t move. Their feet won’t listen to their brain. Frustrated tears well in their eyes and blur Crona’s vision. They’re so useless! She’s right there, she needs them, and they can’t even walk over to her. Pathetic.

 

While they’re busy commiserating their own self worth, Maka squeals and rips them out of their defeatism. The tall man from before - the one with the scarves - has grabbed her and is holding their love, one arm around her arm and stomach, the other grasping her neck and covering her mouth. Before Crona can process what they’re seeing, the struggling pair fade into the shadows of the trees and Crona is chasing after them, spurred by the panic and jealousy and anger and worry writhing inside them. They’ve gone feral, unable to think or feel, obsessesing singularly, desperately over saving Maka.

 

They break through the treeline and into the small wood, uncaringly ripping branches from their trunks, tearing over roots and short growth with reckless abandon. The path ahead is dark, and they can barely see the ground beneath them, as the starlight cannot penetrate the canopy, so they follow the sound of Maka’s struggling: and sound that is both torture and relief.

 

They burst into a clearing and suddenly all is quiet: no Maka, no fauna, no wind. The night is dead and they pray that doesn’t reflect their love. Crona turns, breathing hard and listening harder, hoping for some indication that Maka is still alive. They don’t know who that man is, but he is going to __pay__  for daring to hurt their angel; they will dissolve him in black, drown him in their anger, fill him to burst with madness when they find him. But they don’t sense them. There’s no shouting or the sound of a struggle, no disturbance in the undergrowth, no nothing.

 

“MAKA! Where are you?!” Crona screams. “Please, Maka! I don’t know how to deal with this!”

 

Bright, high laughter rings out above and behind them. “I’m right here, silly.” Crona turns around sharply and, yes!, there she is, floating above the ground like the angel she is, flawless and shining, her clothes and long hair gently billowing. She looks just like she did all those years ago when she followed them into Asura, wearing her white dress shirt and plaid skirt. Crona feels their tension drain away at the sight of her face, soft with baby fat and perfectly kind. As long as Maka’s with them, they’re safe, they can relax. She floats gently towards them and reaches out her hand, letting the appendage settle on their cheek. Crona’s eyes slip shut and they lean into the embrace.

 

__Something is off__ , says Crona’s brain, but they ignore it. Whatever is wrong can wait. Right now, they just want to __be__ : in this moment, with Maka, safe and happy and fulfilled. Anxiety and fear flow out of them through contact with Maka; its like she’s siphoning it from them: a fear sponge. It isn’t an ability they remember Maka having, but its been seven years; she probably picked up a few extra tricks. The feeling intensifies, like a vacuum kicked into high gear, which Crona rationalizes away; they have an overwhelming amount of fear inside them. Soon more feelings join the outgoing stream of emotion - worry, shame, sadness, disgust, envy, joy, accomplishment, awkwardness, calmness - and Crona starts to feel drained, tired in a way they’ve not experienced, like a dried-up well, or an empty bag of peanuts.

 

Blearily, their eyes crack open, but their vision spins too much to even see the trees surrounding them. The mouth follows in an attempt to ask Maka what’s going on, why they feel like this, if she’ll stop, but they don’t get the opportunity. The dew-damp ground greets their falling body and their vision starts to clear; being horizontal helps with that. The downed swordsperson looks up at Maka and she looks down at them, smirking oddly: almost a sneer, but their Maka would never make such an ugly, mean expression.

 

“Thank you, child. Your soul is tainted, but it will be tasty nevertheless,” Maka says in a multitude of voices that are just barely out of sync with each other. It sends shivers down Crona’s spine. They don’t know what she means, or why she sounds like that, or what’s happening; Crona is lost and scared - or they would be if they didn’t feel so damn empty. As is, they’re just confused and tired.

 

They watch Maka stick her fingers into her own mouth and grab her lower jaw. With slow, agonizing strength, she pulls down and unhinges her jaw with a loud crack of tendons. Maka’s mouth stretches into a terrible, wicked, impossibly-wide smile before she gags. Crona looks on in horror as a hand sprouts from her throat and claws its way into the open, followed by an arm, then shoulder, then head. Soon, a whole person has climbed out from Maka’s mouth and she is discarded like shed skin, crumpling to the grass and sinking into the dirt. The whole process couldn’t have taken more than half a minute, but, for Crona, it felt like hours, watching their beloved be stripped away and discarded.

 

The one born from Maka’s mouth - __was that even really Maka?__  - squats down and grabs Crona’s face, forcing them to look at him. Its the man in the scarves. This close, Crona recognizes him. Its Asura, the original Kishin. Crona doesn’t know what they expected, but they aren’t surprised; whether that’s because they somehow knew this or because any surprise was drained out of them, they can’t say.

 

Asura jaw unhinges - silently, thankfully - and he pulls their limp face in his mouth. Darkness consumes Crona’s vision before Asura’s jaw snaps shut and their last act of lucidity and consciousness is to say no. They resolve that this won’t be the end. The Maka they’ve seen tonight must have been a fake, an illusion made by the mad god; they still haven’t seen Maka, and that’s not acceptable; Crona won’t rest until she’s in their arms.

 

The ancient Kishin’s jaw decapitates his youthful usurper.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks as always to my beta reader, Vriska.   
> as always, pls leave kudos and comments, tell me what you liked and didn't. any feedback would be appreciated to hell and back  
> Oh yeah! expect another chapter real soon, to make up for this one being so short ;)


	6. Two agents get way in over their heads, Crona has an identity crisis, and Miss Marie has old questions answered.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which I let up a little bit on the edge. The title kinda explains it all tbh.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i figured yall deserve smth bigger, so heres a big'un.

Its late. The final hours of the night wear into the first hours of the morning and all is still. No cars roam the streets. No shops blind passerbys with their wares. No delicious smells entice potential patrons. The only sound is the wind through the streets. The only movement is the faint scuttling of nocturnal animals foraging in the urban jungle. Streetlamps illuminate the brick roads of Death City, helped minorly by the bit of starlight that penetrates the city’s bloom of light. It is a night like any other, and all Death City residents rest easily under the watchful eyes of their god and his agents. 

It is then ironic that two agents of this divine law break from the norm and wander the streets so late. Sal and her weapon partner Onigiri stroll through the silent streets on their way to their apartment near the upper ring of Death City. Sal, a tall, dark skinned woman wearing dark cargo pants, rough brown boots, thick rimmed glasses, a light grey tank top, and a light, open button up shirt, pulls along Onigiri, wearing bright red heelies, a teal tutu over robotic-print tights, a light wash jean jacket covered in patches and useless straps and buckles, a 1920s newspaper boy cap over an unseemly rats’ nest of black hair, and glasses with asymmetrical lenses - one a pink star and the other a green heart.

The pair are returning from a mission in the sequoia national park. The mission was a short one, barely more than a day trip to the park. Though the mission budget easily allowed for a stay in a hotel, Sal had insisted on returning that night, saying that they had enough time to make it back to Death City to sleep in their own beds and not waste money from Lord Death’s coffers; she had never been one to waste another’s money. Onigiri begged Sal to let them crash in a hotel for the night, complaining about how tired they were from the drive there, and talking to so many people, and the mission itself, but they relented and ceased their pleading when she promised to buy them breakfast the next morning, wherever they so desired. Onigiri took the placating offering with gusto, planning to pig out at Taco Bell as a reward for a job well done. 

So, the two academy agents move through the familiar streets; Onigiri whistles a jovial tune, adding to the quiet din - the constant background noises of a small city that are inseparable from the urban landscape. Sal listens to them and absently tries to match the tune to a song, but its an impossible task; Onigiri is making it up as they go, throwing in bits and pieces of songs from the radio but mostly ad libbing. Their gaze wanders constantly, unable to stay rooted to any single thing for more than a few seconds. Sal marches forward on the main road, tired eyes set straight ahead. Though she had insisted on returning that night, Sal honestly would have liked to rest the night at a hotel and returned the next morning, but the Academy doesn’t need them lollygagging, not while they’re on the clock. Plus, nothing beats their own bed after a mission, the feeling of her silk sheets right after her post-mission shower is indescribably perfect and never fails to knock her into the best sleep ever. 

Sal is brought out of her beddish longing by a sharp gasp and a rough, yet weak, pull to the left. She looks down at her gremlin of a weapon partner straining to pull her on a detour. Unmoved by the feeble weight of her friend, Sal asks what they’re trying to do.

“Taco Bell!” Onigiri replies, as if this explains everything.

“Taco Bell?” Sal asks in an attempt to clarify their intentions.

“Taco Bell,” they say with certainty.

“Why are you dragging me to Taco Bell?” Sal asks, exasperated and tired, but mostly tired.

“You promised me breakfast when we got back, and we’re back now. So, Taco Bell.”

Sal sighs. “Its -” she glances at her wristwatch “- two forty-seven A.M. It’s not breakfast time yet. Can we please just go home instead?”

“You promised! You said -” Onigiri puffs themself up and puts on an air of professionalism “- ‘we don’t need to stop for the night. I’ll buy you breakfast tomorrow if you stop complaining and let us return to Death City.’” They slump back into their usual, casual posture. “We’re back in the city,” they say, gesturing around at the surrounding buildings, “and now I’m hungry for Taco Bell, so hold up your end of the deal and buy me food!”

This isn’t something they’re going to drop anytime soon. It’s probably best to just get this over with. Maybe we can get it to-go and actually get home within the next hour, Sal thinks to herself. 

“Fine.” Sal relents and lets herself be dragged into the park towards the nearby Taco Bell while Onigiri cheers. 

The pair pass through the park’s entrance arch and the green landscape sprawls out before them, out of place in the desert but somehow lush and healthy nearly year-round. Due to Death City’s high budget for city works - at odds with the surrounding areas that are unaffiliated with the DWMA - there are a handful of parks in Death City, each with its own beauty, a mix of nature and meticulous planning and upkeep. 

Sal and Onigiri move along a path through the park’s open, grassy fields, feet tapping against sand-colored stones. A gentle breeze carries the scent of mulch and freshly mown grass. Lampposts, arranged at regular intervals throughout the park, dimly illuminate the green beauty of the late springtime flora. Silence reigns in the park, somehow quieter than the abandoned streets of the city proper, broken only by Onigiri’s rhythmic drumming on their thighs: fidgeting to bleed off energy and attention; their head bobs along to the imagined beat. 

It should be a perfect night for a walk through the park, but Sal can’t, for some reason, help but feel uneasy. She finds herself unable to relax despite the serene surroundings. Her instincts are telling her to hide. She feels like a child who has wandered into a restricted area filled with the danger of being caught and punished; for what, she isn’t sure. With a deep breath, she forces herself to calm down and walk through the park like a normal person. 

There’s no reason to be like this, Sal tells herself. This is Death City, the safest place in the world, under the watchful eye of Lord Death. Nothing dangerous would happen here. 

Statistically, Sal is right. Death City has the lowest crime rate in the world and is consistently hailed as a bastion of peace, sophistication, and civilization. In its 800+ year history - excluding the events put in motion by the witch Medusa - it has had so few violent crimes and murders that it’s name has become ironic. It is, by far, the safest place on Earth. 

Still, even knowing all that, Sal can’t shake the feeling of danger that pokes the back of their head: the feeling of being watched, of being followed, of being hunted by something she has no chance of fighting back against. The feeling of being prey: the primal fear that lurks in the minds of every living creature that tells you run and hide and hope the danger passes over you. 

“You okay?” 

Sal jumps, startled by Onigiri’s question. Sal must have frozen in place while contemplating their uneasy feeling, because Onigiri is a few steps in front of her, a questioning eyebrow quirked high over their shoulder. 

“Yes, I believe so,” Sal answers slowly, uncertainly. It is then that Onigiri picks up on their meister’s discomfort: raised shoulders, tense jaw, clenched hands. They know she doesn’t get like this unless she’s in a majorly stressful situation, like a party. Something is up. They want to know what.

“Something’s up, dude; what’s it?”

“Probably nothing, but… I don’t know.” And she doesn’t; she has never felt anything quite like this. Even on dangerous missions where they’ve been stalked by a monstrous abomination, she’s never felt quite this degree of impending doom. “It feels like danger.”

“Can ya sense anything?” Onigiri asks, their voice low and uncharacteristically cautious. They know that Sal’s feelings shouldn’t be taken lightly; she’s saved their skins more times than Onigiri cares to count with her feelings. As far as they’re concerned, if Sal says there’s danger, there’s danger. They move closer to their miester. 

“Let me check.” 

Sal reaches out with her soul perception in an attempt to locate the danger. Her abilities in this field are slightly below average; she couldn’t hope to match the range or precision of Maka Albarn, a prodigy in the field - hell, she can’t even actually see souls - but Sal is at least able to get a sense of one’s location, strength, and soul type. Based on her current feelings of fearful dread, she would wholly expect to sense a clade of kishin eggs surrounding her and Onigiri. So, when she spreads her perception over the park and instead senses a single person a few dozen meters away, Sal is surprised. She focuses in on that person, as it is the only thing around, and finds it… odd.

It feels like a human, but… slanted, somehow. Like if a human soul were reflected in a funhouse mirror, all distorted and terribly misshapen, but still recognizably a person’s soul, because what else could it be? It doesn’t have the odd permutations of a magical beast or the hungry vortex of a supernatural parasite. It doesn’t have the distinct, chaotic power of a witch or magically-adept animal, though the soul bleeds its own, strange power. It almost resembles Lord Death’s soul, but still that’s not quite right. The soul feels cramped somehow, like a shoebox with three shoes, or a blue-fin tuna in a bathtub, and, for a moment, she feels it could be a weapon-miester pair, but no, its definitely just a single soul. Its uncanny, how almost human it is, and she can’t shed the idea that this appearance is a ruse: a great, ancient dragon disguising itself as an egg. 

“Forty meters to the east,” Sal says as she shuts down her extrasensory perception, “there’s a person in the trees.”

“Just one?” Onigiri sounds surprised. After Sal’s blatant unease, they had expected a small army of enemies. When Sal reaffirms her findings, they ask for the plan.

Sal has to think about this as they cautiously walk along the path, winding ever so slightly closer to the Other’s location. On one hand, who or what ever this is hasn’t done anything aggressive; they haven’t attacked or threatened or made any moves to do so. They haven’t done anything wrong, per se, but it feels like their mere presence is unnaturally dangerous, some affront to the correct order of things, like them simply existing is a wrongness of itself that will make suffer the world by merely being. 

She makes her decision and says, “we have to investigate whatever it is in the woods; If its dangerous, we can’t let a civilian come to harm due to our negligence.” 

Onigiri nods and transforms into their weapon form with little fanfare, slotting comfortably into Sal’s right hand, comfortably in mission mode. The glow of the transformation dies down, revealing a yo-yo: two smooth, weighty disks held together by a middle peg. Each disk is divided into three neon colors: green, orange, and violet on one, and yellow, blue, and red on the other. A pale, nearly invisible string attaches the center, connecting peg to Sal’s middle finger. 

Demon weapon in hand, Sal abandons the path and cautiously starts into the woods with a growing sense of foreboding. She activates her soul perception intermittently, double- triple- quadruple-checking that the soul hasn’t moved, that its not readying an attack, or moving to ambush them, or fleeing, but no. The soul remains relatively stationary, giving no indication that it’s owner has even noticed the duo moving towards it. Unease hangs heavily in the air, a miasma of discomfort and disjointed pain burrowing into Sal’s lungs with each step closer to the target; her chest fills with clay, lumpy and heavy, pressing against her heart, her lungs, her ribs. She tells herself to stay calm, to allow her dozen years of training to lead her as it always does on missions, but she can’t shake the thorny, off-putting feeling of dread. 

Just before she brings the target into sight, when she feels them to be just on the other side of the treeline, Sal hides slips behind a tree and stills herself. Slowly, and ever so carefully, she peeks around the trunk. A small clearing comes into view. Darkness obscures detail, as little light is able to reach from the city or the sky, and Sal waits, letting her eyes adjust to the dim. Slowly, details emerge around the clearing - tall grass and bushes and saplings and rocks and roots - but Sal’s eyes stay glued to the figure in the center of the clearing. 

It’s a person. Though their features are heavily obscured by the darkness, Sal can make out pink hair and dark clothing. Obviously, something is wrong with them; they seem to be thrashing and flailing wildly, muttering and growling at themself. Sal hasn’t seen anything like it, but they’re obviously in pain of some sort. She has to help. If they turn out to be a kishin egg or another sort of monster, she’s confident in her and Onigiri’s ability to subdue and destroy it, but if they’re a human? She can’t leave them like this. 

After a quick mental conversation with her weapon, Sal steps into the clearing and calls out to the stranger. 

“Excuse me, citizen. I am Sal Torres, a two-star miester from the Academy, and this is my weapon partner, Onigiri bin Hadif. Do not be alarmed; we are here to ensure your safety. Do you need assistance of any kind?” is what she meant to say. Instead, what came out was, “Excuse me, cit-” before she was interrupted by an incoming rock, thrown by the stranger in the clearing. Acting on instinct, Sal leaps out of the way, rolling on the ground before coming up in a combat stance, yo-yo at the ready. Her aggressor charges wildly, faster than a normal human could. Sal decides that this must be a kishin egg, and is therefore her duty to destroy it. 

With a flick of her wrist, Sal sends Onigiri at the approaching kishin egg, striking it in the jaw, knocking it’s head to the side and causing it to stumble; Sal presses her advantage and, as soon and her weapon returns to her hand, sends Onigiri back at the egg, again and again. The supernaturally heavy body of the weapon repeatedly slams into the kishin egg’s body: gut, neck, shoulder, chin, rib, arm, gut. As the flurry flies - an impressive combo mid-range combo attack only possible with Onigiri’s strange weapon form - the kishin egg flinches in pain and tries to block, but, with a decade of practice, Sal and Onigiri’s attacks are so fluid and variable that they simply slip around the hasty guard. The flurry of attacks continue until their enemy dodges, it’s inhuman quickness catching the pair off guard, and grabs the yo-yo’s string. With a powerful yank, it drags Sal off her feet and toward it’s cocked fist.

“Soul resonance, let’s go!” With a shout, Onigiri starts to glow: wispy white tendrils of light surrounding the string. The yo-yo’s body curves unnaturally in the air and slams into the side of it’s face. Disoriented, the unholy aberration is unable to defend itself against Sal’s hay maker; she enhances her strength with the momentum of the egg’s pull, like a professional wrestler would do with the ropes. It’s head flies back with a crack and, from there, Sal moves into a close-range combination attack, striking her opponents vital spots with a terrifying precision borne of years of study. When the egg backs up to get a reprieve, she wraps Onigiri around its leg and trips it, dropping it onto its ass before delivering a brutal football kick to the head. Her enemy sprawls on the ground, dazed and in pain. 

Sal may not be the strongest miester, or the most experienced, and Onigiri may not be a death scythe, but, with years of training and teamwork, the pair are a polished, terrifying force. There are few other weapon-miester pairs who boast a range of skills and abilities like Sal and Onigiri, who are comfortable almost anywhere in a fight, able to dish out damage both up close and from a distance. 

Slowly, disoriented and in pain, the kishin egg stands. 

“Were it not for this unfamiliar body I would have crushed you before you ever saw me. I will have to settle for killing you the old fashioned way,” says the kishin egg before opening it maw. A point slides out: the end to a dagger? 

“What kind of dumbass swallows a knife?” Onigiri quips, giggling. They’d never seen something so stupid, but Sal is wary. She knows Kishin eggs often use weapons to kill their victims, but she hadn’t seen one on this one yet; it isn’t unheard of that an egg would kill with its bare hands, so she had, until now, assumed that was this one’s method. A weapon makes this a bit trickier, but if its just a dagger then she should be fine, especially if it were dumb enough to eat its weapon. A firearm or explosive would prove challenging, but a dagger? So far, the enemy hasn’t proved itself strong or fast enough to challenger her in close quarters combat, and a knife shouldn’t tip the scales. 

When the tip of the protrusion starts to glow red, Sal has only a moment to reevaluate her assumptions before she has to dodge out of the way of an enormous blast of energy, the likes of which she has never seen. She throws her weapon up into the canopy and they wrap around a branch before pulling her abruptly upward. The beam passes beneath the miester, and she can feel the heat - the power - try to melt her boots, before it crashes through the forest, felling trees and scattering wildlife. When the energy beam dissipates, its like the sun has been extinguished. Sal can’t see for the lack of crimson light and is vulnerable to the kishin egg’s follow-up attack: a leaping strike that knocks Sal through the air like a wounded pinata, swinging back and forth at a six year old’s birthday. Onigiri takes it upon themself to drop Sal from the branches and mentally call out to tuck and roll as she approaches the ground; without eyes, Onigiri wasn’t blinded by the enemy’s earlier attack. 

Though slow to return, Sal regains enough vision in the night to see the egg casually approaching her like its already won, like no matter what she does to it, it won’t matter. From a crouch, she pulls a a handful of throwing knives out of her belt and lobs them at the egg; the first two sink into its chest and the third misses wide and lands in the dirt. 

The kishin egg looks down, confused, like it doesn’t understand the weapons protruding from between its ribs. This confusion doesn’t last long though, replaced by determination and annoyance as it yanks the knives out by the handles. Blood follows the blades, thick and unnaturally chunky, before stilling in mid air. Sal and Onigiri watch in disgust and horror as, somehow, the blood reverses course and flows back into the egg’s body like a loogie dangled over a younger brother’s face being slurped back into the elder’s mouth. 

Ewwww, says Onigiri, that was disgusting. What the hell even was that?

Some sort of regenerative power? Muses Sal. This could be trouble. Do you think we should retreat and find assistance?

No way, we’ve got this. If it can heal, we just gotta hit it hard enough that it can’t come back, cut it to ribbons and take its soul. 

Understood. Slice and Dice?

Hell yeah! Let’s wrap ‘em and tap ‘em.

Oni, that’s gross. 

Plan in mind, Sal stands and faces her unnatural opponent, calculating the best way to trap it in her net, whether to try an ambush in the trees or a frontal assault. Each has its share of risks; if she tries to lure it into the woods, there’s no guarantee it’ll follow, and it could instead take pot shots with its energy attack; if she attacks it up front, there’s the danger of a counterattack. But, with it’s less than stellar close combat skills, the frontal attack is probably the safer bet.

So, with a shout, Sal charges the kishin egg. She throws her weapon at it and, predictably, they’re knocked out of the way and sent into the air in a long arc. That parry luckily left it wide open, so Sal punishes with a right hook, followed by a left elbow then a a left knee. The egg recovers its senses before the barrage can continue and starts to block and counterattack; though obviously rough and untrained, its attacks carry a lethal energy and Sal has to dodge more often than she’d like, fearing that taking a hit even on top of her block could spell the end for her. 

Fortunately, she doesn’t have to dodge for long, as Onigiri is soon in position. They let her know and she disengages with a feint. She drops and rolls out of the way as Onigiri cinches the slack in their line. Seemingly out of nowhere, meters of string pull tight around the kishin egg, wrapping it like a skimpy mummy Halloween costume: a trap laid by a conniving weapon while Sal distracted it with a melee. The egg’s arms and legs are held tight by demon weapon wire, looped around it dozens of times, and it remains standing purely through the tension of its trappings. The body of the yo-yo is wrapped around a tree trunk, ready and waiting for the next part of their devious attack. 

With a twin shout of “Soul resonance!” the weapon-miester pair pull the line even tighter: Sal with a yank of her arm and Onigiri with a dull whir of their axle. Onigiri’s line digs into the kishin egg’s flesh and it has only a moment to reflect on its predicament before the glowing-white line turns razor sharp. With a bloody eruption, the egg’s body splits into dozens of chunks of various sizes, the wire having moved through its body easily and returned to a taunt, straight line. The body parts fall to the ground in a shower of dark gore. Fortunately for Sal’s weak stomach, the night is too dark to see the details of any individual piece. Regardless, she turns from the sight, unwilling to look at the once-human chunks. 

Onigiri returns to Sal’s hand. Then, with a flash of light, reconstitutes themself into their human form, still holding onto Sal’s hand with theirs, trying to send comfort into her. Professional as she may be, she’s always been disturbed by egregious amounts of blood. They don’t get it, but they understand she needs a moment to center herself after that attack; fortunately its ended every single fight its been employed in - hundreds of kishin eggs have fallen to it - so she has all the time she needs. 

Unfortunately, it’s this assurance of security and finality that spells their defeat. 

With backs turned, the agents don’t notice that the chunks of flesh do not still with death as they should, but quiver with energy. Each piece becomes a puddle, falling apart like jello in the rain. Then, with unnatural intent, the liquefied remains of the kishin egg congregate, lumping together to form a mound. With each passing moment, the lump of not-quite-flesh grows taller and taller. In 15 seconds, the kishin egg has fully reformed, born again from its defeated remains. 

It takes advantage of its enemies’ vulnerable positions, silently spitting up its weapon - not a dagger like Sal and Onigiri thought, but a vajra - and taking it in its hand. Still cursing the unfamiliarity of this body - if in its original form it would have ended the pair of agents with but a thought - it crouches, leaps, and drives the tip of its weapon into the miester’s side.

Sal lets out a blood curdling scream and Onigiri turns to see the newly risen kishin egg pull its weapon out of her side. Red blood, darkened by its multiplicity, sprays into the air for a quick moment before slowing into a substantial flow down her side, staining her shirt and pants irreparably. Before the kishin egg - can they keep calling it an egg at this point? It’s shows powers of a far more advanced state of madness. Could this be a new demon sword? Or even another kishin? They dare not think that the situation is that dire. A demon sword then? - can land another blow with its weapon, Onigiri lets Sal fall so they can try to defend her. The odds of actually defeating the enemy are zero now that Sal is down, but maybe they can distract the demon sword long enough to get Sal out of danger? Onigiri has to duck under a slash to their face as they come up with their doomed-to-fail plan to save their partner. 

They dodge two more attacks before tripping over their miester’s prone body. As a weapon, they’d never prioritized physical abilities, never expecting Sal to fall in battle. After all, an opponent would have to get through them to actually hurt her, so there would never be a need for them to fight. They have barely a moment to regret this hole in their training as a final, life-ending thrust approaches their heart. They screw their eyes shut and tense up to wait for the end, but a loud BANG extends their life and possibly gives her tinnitus. Warm wet droplets splash onto their face. Confused, the weapon opens their eyes. 

Somehow, the demon sword’s hand - the one holding its weapon - is missing, replaced by a messy stump. Onigiri has only a moment to stare uncomprehendingly before a dozen more bullets from the sky tear through their opponent, rending large, bloody holes in its body. It twitches, then crumples, almost but not quite literally melting. Onigiri, hearing a thump, turns to their right and sees god. Lord Death, dressed in cartoon skull-covered pajamas and wielding his twin pistols, steps off his skateboard, which slips back into its place inside Death’s ring. 

“Good job surviving. We’ll take it from here,” says a masculine voice on the other side of them. They turn and see DWMA power couple Mr. and Mrs. Stein. Stein holds a slim hammer - his wife - in one hand and a cigarette in the other, which he drops and extinguishes beneath his boot. The pair of miesters face the demon sword. Stein stares it down as if it had personally poisoned their water supply, burn their crops, and delivered a plague unto their houses, but Lord Death, oddly, has an almost soft and worried expression on his face; Onigiri doesn’t understand. 

Sal groans under them, in pain and bleeding out rapidly, and Onigiri returns to their senses. 

“Doctor, please, you have to help Sal, she’s hurt, it stabbed her, please, you have to save her,” Onigiri blurts out, their word vomit spewing out uncomfortably fast. 

Dr. Stein looks at the fallen miester, then back to the reforming demon sword, then back to Sal, torn between his oath as a doctor and his job as a miester. Luckily, he doesn’t have to choose between fighting and healing because Lord Death motions for Stein to take care of Sal, confident that he will be sufficient to handle the lone enemy. Marie returns to her human state as the doctor drops to his knees and pulls out a first aid kit. She ushers Onigiri away from their partner and then sits opposite to her husband. They both pull on gloves and begin to work. 

With one of the best field doctors in the world helping their partner, Onigiri feels secure enough to look back up at the fight. They can feel the nervous energy rolling off the two combatants, one holy, the other unholy. The demon sword looks downright murderous - no change from earlier - but Lord Death still has that odd, contemplative look on his face. 

“Crona?” 

The word slips from the death god’s lips softly, questioningly, as if seeing an old friend who he thought dead. Despite the word’s soft qualities, it sends a cold shock down Onigiri’s spine. Crona. That’s the name of the second Kishin. The one who swallowed the moon. The child of magic and madness, born only to destroy and consume. Could Onigiri and Sal really have been fighting such a titan? They never stood a chance. There was never a possibility of getting out of this fight alive, if this is really a Kishin. 

“Not quite,” Not-Crona says with a cocky smirk. Death’s eyes harden, suddenly intense and murderous. 

“Asura.” The word is spat like a curse on a gravestone, filled with vitriol and loathing. “Explain yourself! How are you back? And why in that form?” he demands with a snarl. 

“The wishes of children are strange, powerful things, devoid of thought but filled with desire. Who’s to say why they come true some times and not others? I am but a consequence of one such wish, fused to the soul of the granter. Though they would deny and shun the magic that runs through them, the power was still there, waiting for someone to take a hold of it.”

Lord Death’s eyes narrow, frustrated at the Kishin’s lack of answer. “I don’t care about such nonsense. Answer my questions before I beat the answers out of you.”

“Must we always fight, little brother? Can we not just talk? I feel like I hardly know you at all.”

“Answer me! Why have you taken Crona’s form? Is this a sick joke to you, parading around in my friend’s skin? I demand you remove that awful mask and face your execution.” 

“Execution? Hmpf. You’ve already failed to kill me once. What makes you think this time will be different?” Asura smugly taunts. He opens his mouth as if to say something else, but, instead of words, the tip of Vajra pokes out from between his teeth, already glowing red: an abrupt attack to restart the fight. 

The red of Asura’s charging attack reminds Death of times past and of his father, the original Lord Death: another reminder that his father’s legacy bleeds into the present: his inheritance, a world teetering on the precipice of ruin. Before he became the planet’s overseer, he hadn’t been able to fully take in the fragility of humanity, not without the neverending stream of paperwork detailing all the ways people try to destroy themselves. With his current perspective, he can almost understand why his father did all of those shadowy things to try and prevent the worst of humanity from taking hold in the world again. 

“Stay behind me,” shouts Lord Death as he works his godly magic into a defensive, mid-air shield that bears a stark resemblance of his traditional skull mask, preparing to block Asura’s incoming blast and defend his mortal charges. Without further prompt, the kishin fires his laser. It slams into Death’s shield, spraying around the edges like water into a spoon, pushing the god back an inch with its unrelenting pressure. The shield holds fast, a testament to Death’s immortal strength. 

The spray disappears with the end of the attack and is replaced by an airborne Kishin, his body twisted to deliver a spinning kick. A dent appears in the spectral shield at the point of impact and, before his opponent can deliver another blow, Death drops the apparition and jumps high, expertly flipping through the air like an Olympic gymnast off a springboard toward Asura. Death’s foot slams into Asura’s raised guard and the shockwave disturbs the foliage, knocking a few green leaves loose. Death doesn’t stop with one hit though; his next - a punch with his gun - pierces a gap in Asura’s guard, violently pushing into his shoulder. Death flexes his pinkie finger and Liz responds, firing a burst of his soul point blank into the black-blood-body. 

There are many things Asura appreciates about his current body. For one, he’s not trapped in the moon. Another, it is strong enough to handle his soul without breaking down like cardboard left out in the rain. It doesn’t seem to tire. If he doesn’t focus on the pain, it doesn’t make itself known. It regenerates from any wound, no matter how serious. Despite all of these boons, he has just as many reasons to dislike this body; all the proportions are wrong, it is too lanky, the center of gravity is too high, and hair keeps getting in his eyes. All of those annoyances pale in comparison to the intrinsic softness of this body. 

Asura’s arm is removed from his body in a spray of black blood, dismembered by the blunt gunshot. Though black blood tries to return to its original place and fix Asura’s injury, it is too slow. Death attacks again and, with only one arm, Asura is unable to defend himself. The young god digs his shin into his enemy’s gut with a devastating mid kick. Asura doubles over; his head collides with Death’s gun-uppercut and darkness overtakes his senses. The gunslinger god blew his head off with a shot.

Death steps back from his adversary’s limp body, letting it topple to the ground. Despite the potentially dire circumstances of Asura’s return, he can’t help but breath a sigh of relief; it seems Asura’s recently returned state is especially fragile. He isn’t weak per se, but compared to his original nigh-invincible form this seems almost easy. 

Black blood - goopier than it should be - pushes out of Asura’s shoulder and neck, replacing what was just destroyed, and Death has to remind himself that, despite Asura’s fragility, this is still a Kishin and an “easy” fight still has the potential to devastate. Within seconds, the prone Asura has a brand new arm and head and is lifting himself up again. Asura stands without so much as a scratch on him, his injuries forgotten to the flow of blood across his body. 

“Marie!” Death calls out for the woman behind him without taking his eyes off his quarry. She raises her head from Sal’s partially bandaged form to look at Death. “Call Tezca, have him evacuate this part of the city. With Asura’s ability to regenerate, there’s a chance this fight will take a while.” No need to let any of his citizens get injured by a stray blast or piece of shrapnel. Marie calls out an affirmative and pulls out a small mirror, hopping to her feet to make the call. 

Death watches Asura’s eyes slide off of him and onto Marie. The Kishin’s eyes widen at the woman’s movement and he stills, inhumanly statuesque, wanting not for breath and without the beat of a heart. It is as if Asura didn’t notice the matronly weapon when she arrived and is now seized by her sudden appearance. Does he remember her part in defeating him? Does he have a grudge? Is he going to attack her? Before Death can guess himself paranoid, Asura speaks up and destroys his train of thought. 

“I’m sorry.” The words come out in a hoarse, strained shout, as if spoken by an injured child shouting for help one final time after hours of trying to be heard.

Everyone present - sans the unconscious Sal - is taken aback by the words, Asura included. He slaps a hand over his mouth and glares down at himself, as if scared more involuntary words would slip out. Asura’s face pulls away from his hand, trying to remove palm from mouth. It is as if his body - Crona’s body - is struggling against itself, a battle of two wills: the mouth and the hand: word and action. Eventually, the mouth wins, pulling away enough to shout around the lingering finger inside. 

“The tea! It was my fault, I put Medusa’s snake in your tea, the things with Professor Stein, they were-!” Another finger slips into their mouth and yanks sharply, effectively gagging them.

Marie gasps and brings her hands to her mouth, dropping her mirror onto the soft ground in the process, understanding the meaning behind those words. For so long she wondered how Medusa had affected Stein during the Brew mission; none of it made sense, and she eventually shelved the fruitless questioning. Now, at five AM on a schoolnight, Asura- no, Crona confesses to poisoning her tea. Its surreal, how little she expected of tonight compared to how stressfully illuminating it has been. 

Crona frees their mouth and tries to speak again, but is cut off by a punch by Asura. As one, they topple over. Quickly, the two-for-one Kishin combo devolves into a rough scuffle with themself, arms and legs seeming to betray one another at a moment’s notice, switching between trying to protect and attack the pair’s shared face, mostly just succeeding in flailing about. 

Death hesitates to intervene, unwilling to try to tip the scales in either’s favor, ignorant of how he would even attempt to help. Instead, he turns his body to look at Marie while keeping the Kishins’ thrashing form in sight. She isn’t moving, stunned into stillness. With a stern call of her name, he breaks the matronly weapon out of her trance and sets her back to her task of calling Tezca. She gets back to it, brushing dirt off the thankfully unbroken mirror and tracing his number. 

Death turns back to the stalemate between Crona and Asura. He wonders if this is a zero-sum game, the fight between the pair, or if one of them will eventually overpower the other. He wonders how this will end, whether a Kishin will be released into the world, whether the countermeasures he put in place will be able to hold long enough to reimprison the Kishin. He wonders if he will be able to separate Asura from Crona before having to lock them up. He hopes so. No one deserves eternity with that monster, and with this as a potential second chance, maybe he can fix that. He doesn’t have long to ponder, as soon, he’s joined by Stein. 

“Any ideas?” he asks the silver fox. 

The doctor pulls out a cigarette and lights it. He takes a moment to pull as he surveys the fight, if you can call it that. He exhales, the conical cloud of grey-white smoke dissipating in the early morning air. Seconds pass, the only sounds in the clearing are of CronAsura’s scuffle and Marie and Tezca’s call. Stein takes another drag, then, after his second smokey breath, he speaks his mind. 

“It’s hard to say without any sort of lab work, and I wasn’t able to put my full attention on the fight, but judging from what I’ve seen and what Onigiri has told me, there is a distinct possibility that Crona and Asura’s souls have become entwined, like two snakes devouring each other. I saw something similar once before, between Crona and their weapon; the only difference is that it is mutual this time. 

There’s no way of telling how long they’ve been like this. This mixed form could have started during the Battle and then stabilized - for lack of better word - into this, from outright switching control over and over to a near-constant struggle for control. Or, this is simply a window into the middle of a transition from one to the other: no way of telling which way, sadly. It could even be that this is something new to the pair, brought about by their return to Earth, but I think that would be unlikely.

They could have been freed by an outside party, or broken out, or this could even not be the Kishins. It could be a sophisticated copy, maybe a witch’s escaped prototype or some kind of unnatural aberration bathed in the moon’s madness-”

Early sunlight glows, more of an aura of light than a beam from above, refracted oddly by the horizon, bent and bounced around the buildings and trees, returning color to the foliage around them, a dinghy yellow-green. CronAsura goes limp and Stein cuts himself off. 

“-and I’ve lost any idea of what is happening. They tired out, maybe?” Stein finishes lamely. 

Death looks sceptical at that, but CronAsura remains still. As seconds tick over into minutes and the dawn sun pulls further above the horizon, he breathes a small sigh of relief, letting a fraction of the tension he feels go. It seems the Kishins are asleep for now, and it would do to take advantage of that. With the goal of getting CronAsura to a secure location for study and possible containment, Death begins giving orders to the ones around him.

“Stein, I need you to go to your lab and pick up any supplies you may need for a diagnosis and potential vivisection. We have to know what we’re dealing with here. Marie, take Sal and Onigiri to Naigus’ office, then head home. Thank you for helping despite your retirement. And tell Rose I say hello, would you?

“Patty, I’m sorry, but you’ll need to miss work. I need you close at hand, at least for the immediate future. ” She pouts but doesn’t offer much protest past that, knowing that now isn’t the time. 

“Liz, I need you to call Tezca. Tell him to cancel the evacuation and instead have Akane Hoshi and Clay Sizemore prepare the Red Room. Have him cancel my meetings and hold my calls for the day. I’ll need you to stay with me as well.” Liz transforms to her human form, dressed in rose-gold silk pajamas, pulls out her compact, flips it open, and traces Tezca’s call number to tell him what’s up. 

“Mx. Hadif.” Onigiri look up at Lord Death, turning away from their partner. “Once Naigus has looked you over, come to the Death Room for a debriefing.” They nod. “And I know I don’t have to say this.” Lord Death’s voice drops an octave, reminiscent of his father’s serious voice. “But do not speak a word of what you saw here tonight. As of now, tonight’s events are top secret.”

“Dismissed,” he calls to the group. As the humans flit about to carry out his instructions, the death god turns back to look at Crona, his long lost friend, saviour of the world, and devourer of madness. He knows that they’re in there somewhere, still alive and kicking - he just saw proof of that - and he hopes that they’re strong enough to cut the ties that bind them to Asura.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> pws liek nd scrub side


End file.
